Battle at Caldos
by ADorjan
Summary: When his homeworld of Tyr is invaded, retired Scout Kaarin Sanders decides to take his venerable Type S out for one last ride to stop the menace. But will he succeed when he goes against a transhuman warlord leading a fleet of warships powered by Ancient technology?
1. Foreword

This is my novel written for the NaNoWriMo contest in A.D. 2015. In relation to this work, I would like to thank Marc Miller for creating a wonderful setting and equally wonderful role-playing game system, my gaming groups, current and past, whose characters served as inspiration for many of the actors in my book, and Jim Butcher of the Dresden Files fame, whose livejournal posts guided my design of the storyline.

I hope you have as much fun reading this as I had writing it – hopefully more.

This version is without any substantial editing.

– ADorjan, 29 Nov 2015

My apologies for the lack of in-chapter separators, in the initial commit. The automated FFN transcriber ate them. There should be a warning that multiple-linebreaks and separator markings are going to get eaten. This has since been fixed.

– ADorjan, 30 Nov 2015


	2. Glossary

If you are already familiar with the Traveller setting – and that is to be recommended regardless – you can skip the glossary at no harm to yourself concerning comprehension of events. Without at least a cursory understanding of the realities surrounding the characters, following the story may be difficult; it is grounded in the geopolitical and technological realities of Marc Miller's world, but represent merely this author's interpretation. Any inconsistencies between the official setting and this book are to be interpreted as features of MTU (My Traveller Universe).

ooo

Anagathics: Longevity-enhancing pharmaceuticals. Production of artificial anagathics requires advanced technology, but there exist rare substances that have similar effects. Due to matters of succession, often frowned upon in noble echelons.

Ancients: A presumably extinct race operating in known space roughly 300 000 years ago, achieving a technological level far beyond the contemporary major races, then vanishing after an apparent conflict of unimaginable proportions. Many Ancient ruins dot known space, but working artefacts are very rare. Physically, they appear to be similar, but not exactly, to Droyne.

Anglic: A language descended from Solomani English, currently widely used as the Third Imperium's lingua franca or trade language. Also popular among humans living outside of the Third Imperium.

Aslan: A lion-like major race, ruling their own empire called the Aslan Hierate, spinward and rimward of the Third Imperium. Highly tribal, and instinctively driven by the need to own territory.

Augments, cybernetics: Technological improvements to the human (or alien, or other organic entity) body. Most commonly encountered in the form of data presentation aids, communicators and replacement organs. The precise technologies used vary wildly. Augments are somewhat typically frowned upon in high society, especially if they're visible and/or done without medical necessity for them, but there exist worlds where almost everyone is enhanced this way.

Bay weapon: A weapon mounted in its own bay. Allows for much larger weapons than a mere turret, and is only uncommonly found on smaller ships.

Black globe generator: The bleeding edge of Imperial defensive technology, derived from Ancient artifacts. It functions as a two-way, energy-absorbing spherical field. Unfortunately, due to its all-or-nothing nature, one cannot simultaneously use it and see what is on the other side, much less fire weapons through it. Most designs involve a 'flickering' solution, which turns the field on and off in quick succession, allowing for the user to fire out when the black globe is off and block some percentage of enemy fire that happens to come when it is on.

Combat Armour: An advanced, air-tight suit used primarily by marines. It combines the utility of a vacc suit with a high amount of protection against all sorts of damage, including kinetic, laser, explosive and radiation.

Displacement ton, dton: A unit of volume measurement, equal to the amount of space taken up by one metric ton of liquid hydrogen – approximately 14 cubic meters.

Droyne: A winged humanoid major race, albeit one without its own interstellar empire. They are found everywhere in known space, and chiefly keep to themselves, being inscrutable to aliens. Physically similar to recovered depictions of the Ancients.

Fast Drug: A pharmaceutical that slows the patient's metabolism, up to sixty times. Frequently used on the dying to stave off death for transport or until help can arrive, and to conserve vital supplies (like air) in an emergency. Subjectively, users experience time go by incredibly quickly. Normally, the drug needs to wear off normally over the course of a couple of months, but advanced antidotes have been developed to remove this inconvenience.

First Imperium, the Ziru Sirka: The original Imperium – Ziru Sirka, or the Great Empire of the Stars – was established by the Vilani, in the centuries following their discovery of the Jump Drive, and expansion of their trade federation into neighbouring solar systems. Due to the Vilani being a race that favours stability and continuity, their interstellar polity achieved longevity via systemic and widespread suppression of technologies and modes of thought deemed dangerous to society. At the time of its contact with the Solomani Confederation, the Ziru Sirka was already greatly decadent. The Solomani managed to defeat it, despite the obvious disparity of size, and established the Second Imperium in its place.

Fuel: Just about any liquid or gas containing hydrogen in its composition can serve as fuel for fusion reactors, which are the most common source of power in the interstellar community.

Fusion gun: The cutting edge of Imperial weapons technology. Fires beams of fusing hydrogen.

Hivers: A starfish-like, tentacled major race of manipulators and schemers, ruling the Hive Federation, situated trailing and rimward of the Third Imperium.

Humaniti: A collective term for the human subraces, including the Solomani, the Vilani, the Zhodani and the myriad minor human races populating known space.

Hundred diameter limit: A 'safe' distance away from a celestial object, enabling use of the Jump Drive. It is possible to jump within that limit, but it is insanely dangerous and not guaranteed to work – a misjump is likely to occur.

Imperial Interstellar Scout Service, or the Scouts: An agency within the Third Imperium, tasked with maintaining communications, surveying member worlds and exploring the unknown on behalf of the Emperor. They frequently make use of the Type S Scout ship, a one-hundred displacement ton design common throughout the Imperium in many roles.

Jump Drive, or J-Drive: A technology enabling ships to spend roughly a week in another dimension as a means of travel to a distant destination. Typical distances that a starship equipped with a J-Drive can cross in a single "jump" are between one and six parsecs. J-Drives consume a lot of fuel to function, and are only usable outside of the influence of strong gravitational fields (such as those of planets, stars, and even larger starships).

K'kree: A centauroid major race, inhabiting an interstellar empire called the Two Thousand Worlds, situated trailing of the Third Imperium. The only major race descended from herbivore stock, highly xenophobic and genocidal against omnivores and carnivores.

Lasers: Typical starship weaponry. Beam lasers come in the economical 'pulse' variety, and the high-powered 'beam' variety. Both are considered beam weapons, however.

Low berth, cryonics: Low berths are technological devices that allow the cryonic suspension of organic life, enabling interstellar travel without straining life support systems. Medical emergency models are also common, where immediate medical aid is not possible.

Main: A group of star systems located at most one parsec apart from another system in the group, enabling a starship with a weak – and economic – Jump Drive to travel between them.

Major race: A race or species that has independently invented the Jump Drive, enabling interstellar travel. There are eight major races: the Vilani, the Solomani, the Zhodani, the K'kree, the Droyne, the Hivers, the Vargr and the Aslan.

Maneuver Drive, or M-Drive: A reactionless engine utilizing anti-gravity technology. While in of itself, it is not truly reationless, an application of the same technology – in the form of gravitic plates mounted under the floors – can compensate for acceleration on-board while moving. Ten gravities of acceleration are easily attainable using this form of propulsion, but compensation cannot typically handle that much, effectively restricting maximum performance to little more than half that on a particularly speed-optimized starship.

Meson gun: One of the Imperium's advanced anti-ship weapons. It functions similarly to a particle beam, except using meson particles, which pass through matter unhindered until they decay exothermically. This is useful because it permits the weapon to bypass most forms of protective barriers, such as armour.

Meson screen: A field that shields against meson particles.

Minor race: Any sapient species (sophonts) that is not a major race.

Misjump: The catch-all term for a jump procedure going catastrophically wrong. This may mean that the jump bubble fails to form at all, that it fails during transit, that the jumping ship emerges nowhere near their destination, that it doesn't emerge at all, or is otherwise dislocated in spacetime. Misjumps are commonly fatal to everyone involved.

Missiles: Missiles can be divided into conventional and nuclear, and also into dumb and smart. Conventional missiles use non-nuclear explosives to deliver their damage, while nuclear missiles utilize a fusion bomb to provide both a high energy explosion and a burst of radiation. Dumb missiles have minimalistic designs and fuel reserves that let them do one approach to their target only, while smart missiles, should they miss the first time, can turn around and reacquire their targets. Missiles move using M-Drives, at accelerations that would be lethal for most sophonts.

Nuclear screens: A type of defensive measure used by advanced spacefaring races. It dampens the effects of radiation around ships, but does not protect against explosions, or anything else.

Particle beam: A military weapon, which emits a stream of charged particles in order to deal damage. Heavily irradiates targets as well.

Plasma Gun, Man Portable, PGMP: Exactly what it says on the tin – artillery capable of being carried, even fired with adequate strength or gravitic compensation, by infantry. Its bigger brother is the FGMP - Fusion Gun, Man Portable.

Sandcaster: A type of starship defensive weapon. It fires fine sand which spreads over a volume of space, and can reduce the impact of beams passing through.

Second Imperium, the Rule of Man: The polity set up by the victorious Solomani on the corpse of the First Imperium. Due to the advanced decadence of the First Imperium, the Rule of Man inherited its troubles along with its population and structures. It collapsed only centuries after coming into existence, falling victim to an economic crisis of epic proportions and failure of central authority.

Ship armour: Comes in three common varieties – titanium steel, which is cheap and cost-effective, crystaliron which is better, costlier and the common choice for small ships, and bonded superdense, which packs an incredible amount of protection into incredibly little space, but costs a pretty penny, and requires highly advanced manufacturing to make. In addition, there are several types of film coating for hulls, such as reflective anti-laser, radiation-absorbent and non-reflective stealth paint.

Snub pistol: An anti-personnel sidearm designed for use inside ships. Firing soft slugs, it is unlikely to cause hull breaches, while remaining effective against soft targets.

Solomani: A human subrace and major race, originating from the Human homeworld of Earth (Terra), from where the Ancients transplanted the species to thousands of other worlds. Conquerors of the First Imperium, founders of the Second Imperium – the Rule of Man, which collapsed only a few centuries after its founding. Currently, the Solomani are organized into the Terran Confederation, and have recently lost their homeworld to the Third Imperium.

Spinward Marches: A frontier region of the Third Imperium, repeatedly contested by the Zhodani Consulate in Frontier Wars. Notable for the high concentration of Ancient ruins.

Spinward, rimward, trailing, coreward: The directions used by interstellar maps. 'Spinward' means in the direction of the galaxy's spin, while 'trailing' means the opposite direction. 'Rimward' means towards the edge of the galaxy, while 'coreward' means towards its center. While the galaxy is not actually flat in real space, thus requiring two more directions – up and down – interstellar maps reflect the jump space layout, where the abstraction of flatness is usefully applied.

Starport: A facility for handling spacecraft. Typically, it is one or both of the downport, facilities on the planet surface, and the highport – the space station in orbit around the planet. Worlds within the Third Imperium cede the starport and immediate surroundings to the Imperium directly, making the facilities extraterritorial, where only the basic, bare-bones Imperial law applies, rather than any planetary regulations.

Starship: Any vessel utilizing a Jump Drive, and thereby capable of interstellar travel. Ships of a volume greater than 2000 displacement tons are considered capital ships.

System Defence Boat: Spacecraft intended to defend a star system, which don't have a Jump Drive. Due to the amount of space the drive and the fuel for it take up, these vessels are usually more than capable of defeating a starship of equal tonnage.

Third Imperium: The largest human polity in known space, spanning eleven thousand star systems, founded on the ruins of two previous imperial states. Nominally an elective monarchy, de facto a hereditary one. Due to the rigors of interstellar travel, its domain is highly decentralized, individual archdukes, dukes, counts and other local decision-makers having broad authority to use their own initiative. Communication is maintained by a "pony express" network, utilizing small ships to jump between systems and deliver data, before jumping again – a message from one end of the empire to the other can take in excess of a standard year to reach its destination.

Trojan Reach: A frontier region of the Third Imperium, with many independent systems, rimward of the Spinward Marches.

Vacc Suit: A suit designed for survival in vacuum or near-vacuum. Advanced varieties are made with bullet-resistant materials, and are able to seal around small punctures. Most are rated for up to six hours of being cut off from external air supply, and have magnetic soles to aid movement in zero gravity.

Vargr: A major race of canine humanoids, altered from Terran wolves by the Ancients. They are found primarily in the Vargr Extents, coreward of the Third Imperium, but they lack any polities larger than a few dozen systems due to limitations of their psychology. Outside of the Extents, the Vargr are often found engaging in piracy.

Vilani: A human subrace and major race, originating in the system of Vland. Founders of the First Imperium, or Ziru Sirka – the Grand Empire of Stars, which collapsed thousands of fears ago.

Zhodani: A human subrace and major race, originating in the Zhodane system, spinward and coreward of the Third Imperium. Their system of government and societal order – the Zhodani Consulate – rests on the usage of psionic abilities, especially telepathy. Frequently at odds with the Third Imperium.


	3. Chapter 1

Kaarin Sanders sat on the bridge of the Imminent Misjump in the company of his fellow crewman, Mundy Krasnyj. He was, de facto, the Captain, even if the Imperial Interstellar Scout Service did not actually use such ranks – his seniority and skillset meant that he outranked his long-time friend and got to sit in the pilot's seat, the tiny starship having no dedicated command position.

The main viewport showed a steady blue, suggesting the factual case of being in jump space.

"It won't be long now," commented Mundy, leaning out of his seat in the nearby sensors station. The iris valve and door in between them were open, in a minor breach of protocol.

"Could be hours," replied Kaarin, swiveling on his chair. He was twirling his grey-flecked moustache boredly. "Did I tell you about the time when me and that paper-pusher from Records were sent to Rhylanor and the jump took eight days?"

"Twice!" Mundy chuckled. "If I recall correctly, he couldn't fit it into his schedule, and used some kind of accounting mumbo-jump in order to backwards – retroactively – define the jump to have taken seven days, in order to make the books show the right results?"

"It was more involved than that, but-"

Kaarin was interrupted by a sudden change of light colour, from the blue, to black.

"Jump complete to Tyr complete! Are we there, Mundy?"

Kaarin reached back and snapped on his vacc suit's helmet, as did Mundy in the other room. This was part of the regulations that no experienced spacer willingly broke.

"Binary star, spectral classes F and M... four gas giants... there's the starport beacon! We're in Tyr alright and – wait a moment, Captain, I'm picking up fusion bursts!"

Kaarin swore under his breath.

"Give me an overview, Mundy."

"Already on it."

Kaarin's HUD was sprinkled with symbols as sensor data came in. The system's giant blue primary and its tiny red companion in the far distance blazed into view, followed shortly by squares indicating the relatively miniscule gas giants in the outer system and the five other, terrestrial worlds. Tyr was indicated by a different colour, marking it as an inhabited planet, approximately a hundred and twenty diameters from the Imminent Misjump's current position.

Red cross-marks dotted the space between them and the main world, indicating recent radiation bursts.

"Who's doing the shooting?" Kaarin demanded.

"Don't know yet, Captain. I've got five jamming sources, putting them on your screen."

Rhomboid indicators showed up on the screen.

"This close to the planet, some of those have got to be the Tyrian System Defense Force," judged Kaarin. "Twenty years ago, they numbered two ancient SDBs and one converted freighter. See if you can't get a good look at them. I'm bringing us in."

"Aye, Captain."

ooo

Commodore Mebalti was not having a good day. Among the reasons for his displeasure was the poor-quality homegrown coffee he had to endure drinking in the unscheduled absence of a shipment of foodstuffs to the world, the definitely substandard nature of the "warship" that happened to be his flag vessel, and the scandal around his daughter's recent behaviour. But most of all, he was displeased by the presence of a hostile force in the system he was supposed to be protecting.

"Defend the Maccabeus! Prioritize point defense as designated," he finger-painted a region of space in the vicinity of the temporarily – he hoped – disabled defense boat.

The attackers had flown in from the outer system, presumably having jumped in around one of the gas giants, refueled and only now coming in to contest the control of the system. They didn't attack immediately, instead first offering the Tyrian SDF a chance to surrender. Naturally, Mebalti refused such an outrageous demand without even bothering to consult with the King. It would have been the end of his career, if he did such a thing, given the lack of obvious advantage the two small attacking ships appeared to have over his three defense vessels.

Something impacted the hull – or made parts of it explode – and the cargo bay lit up on the damage control diagram as losing air. Mebalti ground his teeth.

"Obvious" and "appeared" were the key words, however, and the attacking force knocked out the Maccabeus' M-drive in the opening salvo. The SDF duly returned fire, to no visible detriment of the enemy. Between the three of them, they had nine laser turrets, plus a bunch of obsolete nuclear missile launchers bought cheap from the Aslan some years ago. The opposition had a remarkable variety of weaponry – a couple of plasma cannons, a particle beam and some missile launchers to top it off. If this were Imperial space, those missiles would be almost guaranteed to be conventional, not nuclear, but as it happened, it was not Imperial space.

"New contact, commodore!" half-shouted his sensors officer. "On your screen. A hundred and fifty diameters out."

Mebalti looked.

"Imperial transponder?"

"Yes, sir! Identification as the IISS 'Imminent Misjump'."

"Who the hell names their ship that?" Mebalti wondered aloud, before returning to more salient matters. "The imperials have no love for us, but hail them anyway. They hate pirates more."

"Aye, sir!"

ooo

The Imminent Misjump burned towards Tyr at four gravities, the maximum its M-drive could pull without doing very unpleasant things to the crew.

"Captain, I'm picking up a transmission, but with the jamming and the rads, I can't make out what they're saying," Mandy said over comms. Given a combat situation, it was wise to close the compartment doors, so they did.

"Which one are we getting the transmission from?" Kaarin demanded, staring at their vectors on the HUD. Mandy remotely indicated the salient vessel. "They're coming from inside the hundred diameter limit – all three of those, except this one that seems to be drifting. Those are almost certainly the Tyrian force, meaning the others are the unknown hostile force. Buckle up for combat, Mandy."

A silent moment passed.

"But is it wise to get involved, Captain?" asked the junior Scout.

Kaarin snorted.

"How could I not? This is my homeworld, and those are my people getting killed, and I'll be damned if I didn't get involved if this were the Emperor's personal retinue on the assault – you get me?" he said, in a tone that suggested gritted teeth.

"Aye, sir, buckling up. Am I supposed to lodge a protest about your, um, questionable, hypothetical loyalties?"

Kaarin performed an ancient ritual of exasperation, his hand prevented from reaching his face only by the vacc suit's plastiglass visor.

"Oh, hell with it, just start the jammers before someone locks on us. And open a channel on broadcast, I want to talk at them."

ooo

The human's voice rang clear on the bridge of the mercenary ship, 'Sponsored Destruction':

"Attention Tyrian System Defense Force, attention unidentified hostile vessels! This is Captain Kaarin Sanders of the Imperial Interstellar Scout Ship, 'Imminent Misjump'. On the presumption of the legitimacy of the local government, I am hereby coming to the aid of the defending force. If I am mistaken in my assessment of the situation, you are advised to clarify as soon as possible, to prevent needless loss of life. If I my assessment is accurate, the hostile force is advised to turn around to the hundred diameter limit and leave before they are destroyed. Repeat! Attention..."

"Who the hell names their ship something like the 'Imminent Misjump'?" Captain Ammvarr Harr asked nobody in particular – in remarkably good Anglic, considering his non-human vocal chords – scratching his furry scalp under his trademark fancy tricorn hat.

"The IISS, apparently," answered his XO.

"Screw 'em, we'll take care of them when we're done with the Tyrians," Harr shrugged. "It's just one of those Type S hundred-tonners. They can't do us shit. Ready another salvo!"

ooo

In comparison with even minor skirmishes in the last five Zhodani-Imperial frontier wars, this confrontation was barely a blip. On the other hand, larger battles were very uncommon among the independent systems, which rarely could boast more than a handful of ships in their navies, should they have a space force in the first place.

On the defending side, two heavily armoured system defense boats – obsolete by standards of the neighbouring great powers, but in principle able to hit above their dainty hundred displacement ton weight, given no need to allocate extra fuel and engine space for jump travel – and one converted, uparmoured three hundred displacement ton freighter serving as the flagship. Joining them from the other side of the enemy – a modified Type S Scout.

On the attacking side, one two-hundred displacement ton frigate – armed with a particle beam bay weapon, highly surprising on a ship that small – and a converted mining ship based on the same architecture as the Type S Scouts.

The altercation was taking place near the hundred diameter limit – an arbitrary safety zone within which it was considered unsafe to utilize the jump drives, on pain of the planetary mass' gravitational influence affecting the J-drive's delicate functioning and risking losing the ship with all hands – since the attackers sensibly did not want to commit to staying in the system without the possibility of leaving in an emergency, and the defenders equally sensibly not wanting to risk losing their orbital facilities or exposing their planet to missile bombardment, especially against a foe which seemed weaker than them.

ooo

"How are we doing on that sensor lock, Mandy?"

"Captain, at this range, we can barely make out where they are, much less break through their jamming and establish any sensor locks," replied the junior Scout. "You're going to have to aim manually, sir."

"I guess it's better than just sitting here doing nothing. Take over helm, Mandy, I'm going to give them some appreciation of Imperial beam technology."

"Aye, aye, Captain."

ooo

"Commodore, the Maccabeus' M-drive is online, but the engineer says it's just a patch job that'll fail sooner rather than later," Mebalti's comms officer reported.

"Good-!" he tried to say something more, but a sudden barrage from the enemy flagship and resulting hits and decompression sirens blaring distracted him momentarily. "Damage report!"

"Hit in the port fuel tanks, sir," another officer, one in charge of disseminating such information, supplied helpfully. "Hull breach on deck two, sending damage control team."

"What are our new friends doing?" Mebalti asked.

"Can't be sure, but it looks like they're burning full tilt and possibly firing beam weapons at the enemy, sir. They don't appear to have hit anything yet."

"They're too far away. They'd have to be very lucky to hit a capital ship."

"Correct, sir."

ooo

Kaarin swore. Five shots so far, no hits.

"Can this rowboat go any faster?!"

"No, sir! Not without disabling the safeties!"

"What are you waiting for then? We need to get closer!"

"Those safeties are there for our own protection, Captain! Uncompensated acceleration would kill us in short order."

A short pause elapsed. Kaarin made another missed pot-shot at the enemy flagship.

"How short an order?"

"Seconds to minutes, sir," Mandy said. He sounded a bit exasperated.

"People survive all the time on high-gravity planets. I've seen plenty of them! I've even walked on one. It wasn't pleasant, but tolerable."

"That's one extra gravity at best, most likely half of one, Captain. It won't help substantially here. Atd those people are adapted for those extra gravities, too!"

"Curse you, physics!" Kaarin waved a vacc suited fist impotently. "Can't you give us one more gravity? One gravity would definitely make a difference!"

Mandy sighed.

"On it, Captain."

ooo

"We got them!" announced Mebalti's sensors officer. "The smaller ship is venting to space! They're changing course to the jump limit!"

"Finally some good news!" the commodore clapped his hands. "Keep them firing, we're going to get through this bastard's armour eventually, and they don't appear to have point defenses at all."

ooo

"Where the hell are you going?!" Captain Harr bellowed into the comm microphone. With only their enemies' jamming to contend with, communication was possible. "Timmons! Get back here this instance!"

"Timmons is dead, this Locker, we got a direct missile hit to the bridge. We're nearly blind, retreating to the jump limit... sir!" came the answer.

"Coward! Turn around, fix your shit, and keep fighting!"

"What's that? kshh I couldn't hear that last kshh breaking up kshh"

"I'll have you flensed!"

Harr tossed the mic across the bridge, where it rebounded off a console. The nearby subordinates cowered against such an unexpected expression of vehemence. His bridge crew of three looked at him, unsure what to think, momentarily mentally disengaging from the fight.

"Focus fire control on the particle beam! Disable that damn dinky flagship of theirs! Before I have *YOU* flensed!"

"Aye, aye, Captain!"

ooo

"D-d-d-this is w-w-worse than I f-f-thought!" Kaarin said with considerable difficulty.

Mandy pressed a button on his console, moving as if he were dipped in molasses. Instantly, the enormous pressure ceased. Both he and Kaarin gasped the first free breath in the last ten minutes.

"Feels as though my back is on fire... what's the situation?" Kaarin turned his attention to the HUD, now that he was again able to think straight.

"Told you, Captain," wheezed Mandy. He unstrapped himself and wobbled over to the sensors console in the computer room. "One of the attacking ship looks like it's breaking off."

"What's the distance? Can we shoot with any accuracy yet?"

"Not really, Captain. Want to accelerate some more?"

The very idea filled Kaarin with dread.

"No. We'd be killing ourselves for no gain. I'm going to shoot at them some more as soon as I regain feeling in my fingers."

ooo

"We got them, Captain! Direct him to engineering! They're dead in space!"

Harr howled with excitement. This was almost as good as boarding and killing these pathetic yokels personally. The last minutes have been a high stakes hammering competition between two highly robust combatants. The enemy flagship took three hits to disable, and all three defending vessels concentrated fire on Harr's ship, and even the bonded superdense armour had been shot so many holes they looked like a Solomani dairy product. They lost some fuel, their M-drive took a solid hit, and the sensor clusters were decimated, but they held together.

"Ignore them, target the one we hit previously."

"Target acquired. Firing in one minute twenty seconds, Captain."

Hurr took off his hat and anxiously whirled it on a clawed finger. It was a tense span of time, during which the remaining two boats managed to get in a few more licks, largely inconsequentially.

"Hit amidships, Captain! Their ship is breaking up!"

"Excellent! Target the last one!"

If there was a lot of anything during ship-to-ship combat, it was waiting. The high-capacity, rapid-discharge capacitors needed to be charged from by the ship's reactor, and that took time. Missiles needed to be loaded into tubes, likewise. A good crew could fire each armanent approximately every five or six minutes. Hurr's somewhat eclectic medley of the criminally inclined tended towards the 'six' on that scale.

"Target acquired. Firing... Hit! They're not done for yet, Captain."

A feeble laser retaliation came from the system's last defender. Their beam weapons were apparently badly damaged, and barely made any hits against the hull.

"Should we offer them surrender, sir?" asked his comms officer. Hurr looked at him with annoyance.

"No. Why would we do that? Rob me of my fun, seeing them blown into space dust?"

"Sir, if we capture them, we'll get twenty-five percent as salvage from the Lord Admiral. That's a lot of money."

"I have expensive tastes," the Captain grinned at the human officer the way only Aslan and Vargr can.

Then the ship shook. Alarms blared. Artificial gravity suddenly failed.

"What the-"

"We've been hit! M-drive offline!"

"Told you to shoot the bastard!" Hurr fought to get his hat back into his hand and onto his vacc suited head, as it had drifted away in zero-g.

"It's not them! It's the scout!"

"What?! You told me they were too far out to be a threat!"

"They were, sir! They're ahead of projections! They shouldn't be this close if they've got a drive graded for four gravities!"

"Screw that, we've got power, shoot them!" screamed Harr in anger.

"We can't move to aim the particle beam in their direction!"

Harr's anger turned to frustration.

"Fix the drive! Fix the drive! Fix the drive before they another hit!"

"Damage control team en-route!"

ooo

"Captain, we must have hit their M-drive. They're drifting, but still have emissions. The last boat is still active, but I don't know for how long," Mandy reported. "If the enemy ship's got power, that particle beam of theirs is still a threat to them."

"But not to us?"

"I don't think so, sir. The emissions profile on that weapon indicates it's far too powerful for a turreted weapon. It's most likely a bay armanent. They won't be able to target it effectively at us without maneuvering, and they can't maneuver without their M-drive online or some other means of altering their heading."

"Do you think they've got thrusters?"

"No idea, sir."

"I'll just keep drilling them full of holes and hope for the best, then. Get me a sensor lock, will you?"

"Aye, sir!" said Mandy and left the bridge to reoccupy the computer room.

ooo

As it happened, the damage control team did get Harr's ship's M-drive back online, if only just barely. By the time they did it, however, they've received a solid hammering from both the incoming – but still distant – scout and the defense boat which moved out of the way of more shots. The whole ship was barely holding together, several crewmen were injured when the jump drive caught fire and exploded – but the power plant and the ship's primary weapon were still online and ready to be used.

"About face and give the Imperial bastard a taste of its own medicine. Fire when ready!"

ooo

Particle beams are deadly things. Not only are they a substantially more powerful anti-ship weapon than mere laser beams, the accelerated particles they use tend to decay, releasing a whole spectrum of nasty radiation. It was just bad luck that junior Scout Mandy Krasnyj happened to be outside of the reinforced bridge section of the Imminent Misjump when it received a glancing blow that probably would have torn the scoutship apart if it had impacted more squarely.

"Mandy! Mandy!" Kaarin screamed into the suit comm as he threw off the seat belt and hurried off the bridge amidst squeals of the fire alarm.

The computer room was on fire. Kaarin grabbed a nearby fire extinguisher and let loose inside of the small chamber.

"Mandy!" he continued shouting.

There it was, the tell-tale outline of a human body covered with soot and extinguisher foam. Kaarin snatched it up by the shoulders and dragged him into the bridge, closed the iris valve and hurriedly checked his comrade's suit's lifesigns indicator, removing the gunk that accumulated on the display. It read:

DEAD.

"You sons of whores are going to pay for this!" Kaarin screamed and sat back at the turret operator's console.

ooo

There are many ways to disable a starship. If its external sensor clusters are shot out, a ship is blind and cannot effectively fight anymore – repairs would have to be carried out by teams in EVA, which during a space battle can be a highly risky proposition. Alternatively, destruction of its drives means that a ship cannot maneuver – or cannot leave the system by jump travel in case the J-drive has been hit one too many times – but can often defend itself, if it has swivel turrets. Destroying the fuel tanks, which are commonly placed on the exterior of the ship, just under the armour and hull, is another popular way to kill a ship's ability to defend itself – without fuel, it can't power its fusion reactor, and therefore will run out of power in short order... unless it has a backup source of power.

There are approximately two ways to destroy a starship. The first one relies on hammering it so hard, and so repeatedly, that hull integrity eventually fails and the ship drifts apart in fragments, no longer being useful for anything but scrap.

This is what happened to Captain Harr's 'Thresher'. Having had one too many laser beam remove a critical part of the ship's structure, it simply broke up in four large pieces and many smaller ones.

Then, continued barrage from an enraged Scout showcased the second way a ship can go, setting off one of its few remaining nuclear missiles, drifting unprotected. A chance one in a million, against all the safeguards its designers put towards the munitions never exploding except when intended. It put an end to any chance of there being survivors in the wreckage.


	4. Chapter 2

The airlock cycled and the other door opened.

"Welcome aboard the TSF Konnichiwa, Captain Sanders," the large man with the scarred face – Commodore Mebalti - said. He was in the corridor right outside the starboard airlock in the company of a woman in her sixties, and an overweight fellow with a bald spot. "These are my first officer Nana Alter and my chief engineer Simler Dirdle."

Kaarin attempted a measure of external composition. "Retired Senior Scout Kaarin Sanders," he introduced himself, skipping pleasantries.

"The kingdom of Tyr owes you a great debt, Captain," Mebalti continued, unabashed. "If not for your timely intervention on our behalf, there would not have been a Tyrian navy for much longer."

"It would have been hard to remain neutral when your birthworld is being attacked," said Kaarin flatly.

This appeared to surprise his welcoming committee.

"I left Tyr when I was eighteen. Enlisted on a freighter bound for Tobia," he explained simply.

"In that case, let's not just stand here, I have a bottle of wine or three prepared in my quarters, for a little private celebration of our victory!"

Kaarin was about to refuse, but in the end, getting drunk is what he wanted in the circumstances. He let Mebalti lead the way and jabber on.

ooo

"That's the sixth glass, Captain!" remarked the chief engineer, himself sipping on a cup, an hour later. "Didn't take you for a hard-drinking man."

"Ugh," half-groaned and half-sighed Kaarin, putting the wine down. He didn't feel any better, but at least his thoughts were scattered.

"Alright, Captain, slow down with the swilling and tell us why you're so damn sad," Mebalti shook a stick of jerky at the scout. "This is a time for joy. The enemy is defeated, we are alive!"

"But my best buddy of seven years is dead," Kaarin said.

A pregnant pause filled the air.

"And?" the first officer raised a wrinkled brow.

"What d'you mean, 'and'?" Kaarin blinked at her.

"You know how many people died in this fight?" she asked. "Seven. Ten more are injured."

"Anyone you cared about, then?" he glared at her.

"No, but that's not the point!"

"You're alive. He's dead. We're alive, even if our comrades are dead," agreed Mebalti. "She should know," he indicated the old woman. "She's lost a son and two grandchildren in the rebellion twenty years ago."

"Please don't drag my personal history into this, Commodore," she frowned at him.

"Have it your way, Nana," he said to her and turned back to Captain Sanders. "Do you have any family left on Tyr?"

"My father died when I was thirty. I think I might have some cousins if my aunt and uncle had any kids. Never checked. Wasn't in these parts very often."

"But you still wanted to retire here?"

"I-" began Kaarin but a buzzer interrupted him.

"Enter!" bellowed Mebalti.

"Commodore! It's his highness! He wants to talk to you and your guest!" announced the comms officer.

"Let's not keep the King waiting, then. We'll take the call on the bridge."

ooo

"Your Highness," said Mebalti at the projection of the King of Tyr. Kaarin Sanders stood by his side, now regretting drinking so much. Fortunately, being in the virtual presence of royalty had a sobering effect.

"Commodore. Captain Sanders, I presume?"

"Yes... sire," said Kaarin, remembering basic etiquette.

The King was somewhat younger than him, wearing an opulent formal robe. The lines of his face suggested a lifetime of being overly serious in all things.

"Congratulations are, I think, in order," he said. "First to you, Commodore,for your spirited defense of the realm. Secondly, to Captain Sanders, for his freely given, supererogatory assistance in it."

Both said the obligatory "thank you"s, Mebalti proudly, Kaarin mutteringly.

"But that is not why I am calling you two today. This is a formal summons to my summer court in Liberation, at your leisure." Both recipients understood that last part as "as soon as possible, preferably sooner". "We need to discuss matters of some import, to which radio communication does not lend itself. Coordinate with my castellan for your arrival. Sovereign, out."

The transmission ended.

"Well, Captain, I guess you're moving up in the world. I'll get us a shuttle."

ooo

Liberation was one of Tyr's larger cities – which wasn't saying very much. It boasted fifty thousand inhabitants, making it one-sixteenth of the planet's population. Tyr wasn't very populous in a large part because of it being chiefly a cold desert. For those raised on substantially less welcoming worlds – such as those without an atmosphere that could support terrestrial life – this place would be paradise, provided most of its food could be imported from someplace. At one point, centuries ago, Tyr was home to millions and the capital of a tiny interstellar empire, but when it fell – as all empires do – it turned out that the poor soils of the world could not cope to support a population that large, especially not after a devastating civil war had sapped their manpower. Since then, the strength of the Tyrians has recovered, but it was still shy of a million, scattered around the oases and the minimally warm equatorial region.

Kaarin himself was never this far north – he grew up in the urban zone nicknamed 'Spacetown', around the planet's solitary starport, and wasn't exactly interested much in the exploration of the frozen, dry dirtball that was his home. In the intervening years, he had come to miss this place, which was one of the reasons why he came back.

The royal summer palace was a feat of antigravity engineering, and Kaarin got to see a lot more than the average citizen from the shuttle as they were kindly permitted to enter restricted airspace, and not shot down by the surface-to-air missile sites located in strategic locations. Built into a large meteorite crater, the six towers of the hexagonal construction could easily have had a hundred and fifty meters. The whole center of the depression was covered by a white dome, with a landing pad on its peak. All around it, stretched Liberation's eclectic, unplanned collection of housing and industry. Further out, frost-resistant crops painted the landscape with greens and yellows.

Luckily for Kaarin, his dress uniform had survived the battle, and he didn't look out of place next to Commodore Mebalti as they were greeted by a valet after landing, and escorted under light guard to one of the King's personal conference rooms.

He wore a uniform in a similar style as the commodor, but with obviously more medals, badges and frills. Overall, the King looked less opulent, but just as regal as two hours before in the summons, and doubly serious. Besides him, there was a woman in the room, wearing a conservative dress. She was approximately the King's age, and overall gave the impression of a similar character as the sovereign.

"Gentlemen," the King acknowledged them with a nod. "Thank you for coming. Sit down. My wife, Katrine, shall expound."

They sat, and the Queen operated the holographic display, which projected a two-dimensional representation of a starmap, centered and zoomed on the Tyrian system, with its immediate neighbours – Sagan, Tktk, Hecarda, Lacidaeus, Caldos, Ace and Acis.

"Although we are victorious, we can ill afford this kind of victory," she begun. "According to the commodore's report, which I have no doubt is accurate, the Maccabeus is beyond salvaging, and the Konnichiwa will be in repairs for the better part of a month. That leaves only one TSDF ship capable of combat immediately. We have, of course, ground-based and orbital defenses, but those are static – we cannot do anything to a foe who stays beyond our range and sends large rocks our way, for instance."

She made sure the two were on the same page before continuing.

"Computer storage recovered from the wreckage of the enemy flagship confirms our fears – these are not pirates, or even opportunistic independent adventurers, but rather part of a larger organization."

This was news to Kaarin – he neglected to break into the royal lady's monologue, however.

"Apparently, there is a force of warships operating in the Trojan badlands, under the command of a 'High Admiral Peter the First'. This is a holopicture of him we've managed to recover," she said, and pressed a virtual button, which changed the display to the bust of a handsome middle-aged man, with a certain smug air of supreme confidence about him, hawkish Solomani features, and eyes that showed telltales of cybernetic augmentation. "We have precious little information about him, and all of it comes from the databanks of the destroyed ship. What we do know is that he's apparently out to carve himself an empire in our region of space. Our psych team, based on the recovered communication logs, have constructed a preliminary profile of his personality – high likelihood of amorality and pathological ambition, low empathy."

"So he's a conqueror," ventured Kaarin.

"Very likely, Captain Sanders," nodded the Queen.

"And he's coming here."

"That is also likely."

"What's so special about him?"

"That is the crux of the issue," the King spoke up. "Aside from having more synthetic flesh than organic, if the documents are to be believed, he's collected a whole gallery of Ancient artifacts, which he applies to great effect on his flagship, the Pagaton."

"Pagaton... isn't that a planet? Somewhere in the Spinward Marches," Kaarin mentioned, having had much of humanity's tiny section of the galaxy memorized over the decades of service in the Scouts.

"That is correct, Captain Sanders," said the Queen. "We're investigating any possible connection between the name and the ship."

"The salient point is," said the King, "that he's somewhere in the area and he's already sent a vanguard to try to secure Tyr. Given the escape of the other ship involved in the attack, we must assume he will be notified sooner or later about the Vargr's failure to capture our system. According to our psych techs, he will probably come personally."

"In which case the chances of our continued survival are rather trivial."

"Isn't that a little pessimistic, Your Highness?" the Commodore spoke up. "We are repairing the Konnichiwa, and can begin immediately on the construction of additional warships. We have the facilities, and we have enough traders passing through to import a boat or five, if need be."

"This is unlikely to substantially help," replied the King. "We don't have the specifications for the warlord's Ancients-equipped flagship, but we do know it is in the 2000 displacement ton range."

The Commodore made a face.

Kaarin let out a low whistle. "That's almost a capital ship."

"Indeed. Short of fielding a vessel of similar displacement, there is little chance of achieving victory."

"But your highness has a plan."

The King looked at his wife. She zoomed out the projection. Now the map showed a large section of the Trojan Reach.

"We are bordered by the Aslan Hierate and one secessive state of theirs, the so-called Glorious Empire, the Florian League and the Third Imperium. These are the only the major polities relevant to our interests here – the ones who can provide enough back-up to stand against the invasion when it comes," she expounded.

"Commodore, Captain. In your opinion, which of these is most likely to actually help us?" the King asked.

"I don't think the Aslan have a dog in this fight," said Mebalti. "The Florians might help, but they're defensively minded, and detaching enough of their relatively small navy here would make them vulnerable. I don't think they'll help. The Imperium, yes, they might. They've always claimed this region as their sphere of influence," he looked quizzically at Kaarin. "But they're too far away to get to us in time. It would take months to reach the edge of their space, and as much to get back, and that's without time spent on negotiations."

"There's a research base nearby. In Dostoevsky," the Scout pointed. "I believe they've got a picket there, but I don't know their strength."

"Does that not count as giving away military secrets to foreign powers, Captain?" the King arched an eyebrow.

Kaarin shrugged. "I haven't given away anything secret. And I'm Tyrian, and wanted to retire from service here."

"Wanted?"

"Well, my services are obviously still required. I've got the only jumpworthy ship in this system right now, and you need help, sire."

"Well deduced, Captain."

"Is there anyone but the Imperium who can help?"

"We're just about the most advanced and militarily powerful realm within six parsecs," said the Commodore a bit proudly. "Acis has a space navy, even if it's a little bit less advanced than ours. Number One is too broken up politically to field one. Caldos is comparatively unified, with only three major factions, and they do have starships – but they're backwards, bought from third parties, and the yokels can't maintain them without help. That leaves Dostoevsky, which is an Imperial client state. They have their own force in addition to the Imperial naval garrison stationed there."

"My ship is rated for jump two," Kaarin revealed. "If I went by the rimward route, I could stop by Caldos and investigate chances of them helping us there, on my way to Dostoevsky."

"That is a decent plan," agreed the King.

"Not that I'm looking a gift horse in the mouth, but is that ship actually yours?" asked the Commodore.

Kaarin grimaced. "No, not really. I have it on loan from the IISS, and it can be recalled to active service at any time," he admitted. "I still have use of it for the time being, and I believe using it to help you is in direct interest of the Imperium." He wasn't all that sure of that last one, but that was what he was betting on.

"I'm glad you feel that way, Captain," said the sovereign. "It is decided. You will make way first to Caldos, then to Dostoevsky, with the intention of securing their military assistance in the anticipated conflict against this warlord."

"What do I offer them in return?" Kaarin asked.

"We shall delegate an envoy to go with you. He will take responsibility for negotiations."

"Oh, good. Thank you, your majesty." Kaarin did not feel very confident in being able to play the high stakes court games required of aristocrats and diplomats. "My ship needs some minor repairs, I assume I can count on that?"

"You may."

"Also, I would very much appreciate a starship engineer. Scoutships are designed to be flyable solo, but it's not a pleasant experience."

"The engineer from the Maccabeus survived the battle. I'll arrange the transfer," said the Commodore.

"Anything else you need, Captain?" asked the King.

"Uh, yes, actually. Could I get an emergency low berth installed? Just in case someone dies on my ship again and they can be frozen for reanimation later."

"Granted."

ooo

"Remember, that you are dust, and dust you shall become," said the priest officiating the ceremony, and the four men lowered the coffin into the hole.

It was cold outside – as were most days on Tyr – and Kaarin felt a particular tightness of breath, due long absence from its thin atmosphere. The overall mood of the ceremony could only be made sadder by drizzling rain, but it hardly ever rained on the planet. The four began shoveling the sandy soil into the grave. The attendees – some spacers who felt obligated to attend Mandy's burial, to give last respects to an erstwhile comrade in arms – began to disperse.

"Captain Sanders?" said someone behind him. Upon turning towards the voice, he saw an older man with a long, shaggy beard, in a black suit. Kaarin noticed some resemblance between his dress and the priest's. "Pleased to meet you. I am father Yosef. My condolences."

"Thank you," Kaarin said stiffly. "Anything I can do for you?"

"Why, I wouldn't mind a ride to Caldos and Dostoevsky, sometime within the next couple of days," said he.

"Are you the engineer or the diplomat?"

Yosef snorted. "The 'diplomat', of course. I serve as the court chaplain to his majesty, the King. And I appear to have been delegated to go along with you on this ride."

"You're a priest."

"Yes. I am. What of it?" the man cocked his head at Kaarin.

"It's not common to see a priest serving in the government," Kaarin replied, a bit lamely. "You're of the Solomani faith, right?"

Yosef winced. "That is a horribly, horribly misleading way to put it, young man! If only it were true!" he raised his arms to the sky. "The people of Earth are hardly united in the True Faith, and have lamentably never truly been. Concisely, however, you have it right that our Faith originates on Earth, which God had blessed as the homeworld of Humaniti. The Universal Assembly, which I humbly serve, is among the most ancient of human religions, stretching back into the darkness of prehistory. Our Holy Book," he reached into his suit, drawing an black hardcopy tome in small format, "remembers the invention of writing! As the Terrans spread the light of God during the days of the Second Imperium, so shall we not rest until all are one in our Lord and Saviour."

"Right," said Kaarin, after a little pause. "I guess you're well-matched to your profession. I mean, you obviously like to talk."

The priest laughed. "We're going to get along just fine."

ooo

"Hey, watch where you're welding that!" Kaarin rebuked the technician. "An inch more and I won't be able to open the toilet. And that would be terrible."

"Sorry, sir."

It was nice to be in space once again. Though his mind was still made up about settling down on Tyr, it was going to be quite a step to acclimatize to planetary conditions. On a starship, the gravity was standard, the pressure was standard and the temperature was standard. Hell, the moisture was standard too, and there was no weather to speak of, except perhaps on the truly gigantic capital ships, sometimes. Groundside, he had to contend with a certain lack of... stability.

There was a chime from the airlock, disturbing him from his ruminations. Someone was at the door.

It turned out to be a Tyrian navywoman, in her twenties, thin as a stick even in the pressurized uniform, with a face that bore the conspicuous lack of marks indicative of never smiling.

"Petty Officer, 3rd class, Sai Marte, reporting for duty!" she said, saluting in the Tyrian manner. "I am to assume the position of engineer on this ship, sir! Are you Captain Kaarin Sanders?"

Kaarin raised both eyebrows. Women in engineering were just about as rare as hens' teeth – whatever a 'hen' was. "At ease. Yes, I am him. Didn't you get a briefing on me?"

"Sir, I did, but I am not good at facial recognition, sir."

"Drop the excess 'sirs'. This isn't really a military vessel, and I'm not a marine sergeant."

She seemed uncertain what to do with that directive.

"Ah, hell, just come in. The staterooms are on the right, and engineering is down the hallway. Pick a room that isn't mine or being picked apart by the repair crews, and get settled in."

"Yes, sir!"

Kaarin sighed and let her through. First the holy man, now this eccentric bint. He'd have to see about getting out of the system as soon as possible before they saddled him with an entire panopticum of their strangest personnel.

ooo

"'Imminent Misjump', you are clear for departure. Releasing docking clamps," said the voice in the comm.

"Roger that, 'Imminent Misjump' away," replied Kaarin. "Captain Sanders out."

"Who named this ship?" asked Yosef, in a manner that suggest that he didn't really expect a good answer.

Kaarin pulled the ship out of its berth at the highport and set a course opposite the angle vector of the planet, heading for the hundred diameter limit. "I don't know, but you know that thing where if you say, 'what's the worst thing that could happen?' you're tempting fate to demonstrate that your imagination is deficient about the terrible things that can, in fact, happen?"

"Yes, I believe that's one of the universal superstitions. The Solomani and Vilani both acquired it independently, and I would wager that the Zhodani might have an equivalent as well."

"I think this is like the reverse. You're tempting fate by daring it to, basically, kill you. And since fate is there to frustrate your expectations, you never actually die in a misjump." Kaarin put the ship on auto-pilot once they left the proximity of spaceborn chunks of metal in orbit.

"Truly the logic worth of a pagan," Yosef nodded mock-solemnly.

"The jump drive is ready for jump, Captain," came Sai's voice over the internal comm. "Shall I plot a course for Caldos, sir?"

"Do that. You have a couple of hours before we reach the limit."

Yosef clasped his hands.

"Our holy Guardian Angel, ask our Lord for a blessing for the journey that we embark on, so that while en-route we might enjoy good health of soul and body and that we happily return home, finding our families in good health. Guard us, lead and protect. Amen," he said fully seriously.

"We are going to have so much fun over the next week, I can tell," muttered Kaarin.


	5. Chapter 3

"Attention all hands, we have exited jumpspace and arrived in the Caldos system," announced Kaarin through the intercom. Father Yosef wandered onto the bridge holding a cup of stimulant.

"Good morning, and God bless, Captain. I trust all is well?"

"Sure. We got dumped in the inner asteroid field, though," Kaarin set a course for the system's main world, one of seven planets. "We'll need a day and a half to reach our destination."

"Is that safe? The asteroids, I mean."

Kaarin snorted. "Only you've watched too many holovids. They tend to present asteroid belts as some sort of whirling morass of rock flying about in every direction. And that's about as far from the truth as can be," he shook his head. "There's really, really, really little rock in the belt, compared to the amount of empty space. If I set the ship on autopilot to follow their average orbit the whole way around the sun, we'd probably not hit even one rock. They also don't fly around willy-nilly, otherwise there wouldn't be a belt for long, it would just disintegrate. There's zero danger to us from being here, pretty much."

"I'm glad," the priest nodded. "I'm also looking forward to setting foot on the planet, breathing a lungful of fresh air-"

"I disadvise that," Kaarin swiveled on his chair towards Yosef. "The atmosphere's far too thin here to breathe without a respirator. You'd die of hypoxia. You'd probably get dust in your lungs, too, with how extremely dry that place is."

"I'll take that into advisement, Captain. It's curious that a world like this has such a large population, don't you think? All those hundreds of millions of people, living on a world that cannot support them."

"The catalogue says they import their foodstuffs from the other worlds on the Sindalan Main. Mostly Acis, and from Dostoevsky too. If those two got cut off, they'd die in droves."

"God forbid. I hope it never comes to that," said Yosef.

"Have you seen Sai today?" Kaarin changed the topic.

"Unless I miss my guess, she would be in engineering, which she rarely leaves, except to sleep."

"I can't get a handle on that woman," admitted Kaarin. "Do you know her from before?"

"Just because we're from the same planet, doesn't mean we know each other, Captain."

Kaarin made a face. "Yes, yes, I'm from Tyr too."

Yosef smiled and sipped some of his stim. "No, I do not know her, and I assure you, Captain, that I find her just as mystifying as do you. But enough gossip, lest we venture into the sin of detraction."

Kaarin did not know what 'detraction' was, but simply assumed it was one of the myriad ritual taboos this priest's faith mandated. "Yeah, how about you keep watch on the controls, while I go see if our engineer hasn't mysteriously died and we didn't notice. Don't touch anything. If lights begin blinking threateningly, shout."

"I'll be sure to notify you immediately if the stim machine's filter needs changing, Captain."

"Har, har."

ooo

"You alive in there?" Kaarin peered into engineering, hanging inwards by the frame of the iris-valve doorway. He half-expected there to be a hammock hung up between the two halves of the M-drive, but there wasn't. The whole place was immaculately clean and orderly. Sai Marte sat at the engineer's terminal.

"I am alive, Captain," she confirmed, turning to him.

"You know, you haven't visibly done anything but stay inside engineering, watching the jump bubble stabilization logs. Aside from eating and sleeping," he told her. "I'm not actually sure about that last one, because I don't have a habit of investigating what my crewmen do in their staterooms when they're off-duty."

"This is my job, Captain," she said flatly.

"No hobbies?"

"No, sir."

"Interests?"

"Yes, sir. Starship systems design and operations. In addition, I also enjoy computer architecture and low-level programming."

"Any complaints about your assignment here?"

"No, sir."

"I'll just let you do your job, then, Engi," he used one of the casual, but polite terms for the chief engineer on a starship.

"Yes, sir."

"Just a heads up – we'll be arriving at Caldos tomorrow evening."

"Yes, sir."

She turned back to her console, spitting out irregular sensor data about the jump bubble field that prevented the unique physics of jumpspace from overwhelming them. Kaarin threw up his arms in exasperation behind her back and went off to get a good night's sleep.

ooo

"This is Mycian Space Flight Control to Imperial Interstellar Scout Ship 'Imminent Misjump'. We're feeding you navigation data to the downport."

"Acknowledged, Flight Control. Approaching for a landing on the surface," replied Kaarin. The planet was roughly the size of Tyr, and the gravity posed absolutely no threat to the scoutship's mid-high-end maneuvering drive. "Did you get anything arranged with those hobnobs over the comms, Yosef?"

"Why yes. We are all invited to the Mycian Emperor's palace for the length of our stay," replied the priest. "I've arranged for you two to be considered my bodyguards, entitling you to retain the possession of your weapons while we make the journey from the starport to the Emperor's court. You'll have to surrender it on-site, though, for obvious reasons. No need to thank me."

"Gee, and I get to leave my ship here, unguarded?"

"The Emperor has agreed to extend safe passage to us. Shipjacking would be very poorly seen, an insult of the highest order. I'm certain nothing will happen to it while we are away, provided our docking fees are taken care of."

"With the kind of budget the King gave us? I could be paying for this spot for the next ten years," snorted Kaarin.

With the use of antigravity technology, entry into the atmosphere did not require a highly heat-resistant hull – although starships routinely had those anyway – and Caldos' own very thin shroud was a non-issue anyway. The ride down to the planet took only minutes.

Towns had a habit of springing up around starports, due to natural convergence of population and trading opportunities, and this world was no different in that regard than the hundred thousand in known space. It was not substantially impressive to a spacer, however, given the world's lack of advanced technology. The Caldosians have only recently mastered industrial nuclear power to a practical degree, which meant that most of their buildings were raised using only conventional architecture, with no reliance on anti-grav techniques. As a result, they were comparatively short, except some minority of taller tower-like protrusions over the urban zone that seemed to stretch from horizon to horizon. There was no agriculture anywhere in sight.

"Touchdown complete. We're here, boys and girls," Kaarin announced, and looked over the other two. "Everybody in their fanciest outfits?"

Fancy might have been an overstatement in Yosef's case, who wore a pretty simple outfit, all considered – a black robe with a white collar and a square-ish sort of hat. No frills, but suitably serious in accordance with his duties. Sai, on the other hand, had a Tyrian dress uniform, which for enlisted spacehands was less than impressive. This all meant that the Scout looked shiniest of the trio. The only thing spoiling the overall impression were the respirators which they needed to have in order to survive for longer than an hour or two on the planet's surface.

The underpressure hit them gently in the airlock, on the edge of bearability. Outside, they were met with a squad of security personnel, wearing advanced flak suits and, of course, breathing apparatus. Kaarin suddenly felt a bit reassured that he got to keep his laser pistol, for now, anyway. Being escorted under guard did not stir any especially good memories.

"Envoy Yosef from Tyr, with escort, I presume?" asked the leader of the unit. "Commander Elkin of the Palace Guard. We're here to provide you escort to the palace."

"Of course, commander. Are there any updates on when the Emperor will likely have time to see us?" Yosef asked, assuming the front position in a triangular formation, where Kaarin and Sai made up the other nodes. Their escorts fell in around them.

"The Emperor will meet you tomorrow, I believe," said the guard commander. "It is late today."

"Please extend my sincerest thanks to His Imperial Majesty for treating this matter as a priority," Yosef replied. "It really is a matter of the highest urgency, and the sooner we can speak with him, the sooner we can put the threat to rest."

"I will convey your words, envoy," promised the guard.

ooo

"I tell you, this Emperor really knows how to billet visitors," said Kaarin, sitting in one corner of the jacuzzi, sipping on bubble wine. "My quarters are bigger than my whole ship!"

Yosef was there too, partaking of the luxuries available to them in the common part of the wing allotted to them.

"I'm frankly more impressed with the amount of high technology on display here, as if such things were common on this world, which I know for a fact that they are not. I am still impressed, you are also, and I think that is much of the point, my dear Captain," the priest said. "We are meant to be impressed by the Mycians wealth. Even if they don't have the technological base to produce these marvels, they can sell the output of their industrialized economy and buy items of advancement... Sometimes, I regret not joining a monastery and becoming a monk. Other times, like these, I do so greatly not regret having made vows of poverty."

Kaarin threw back his head and laughed. "You and me both! I sort of wish Sai was here with us, though. She doesn't look like much, but I've never seen her in anything other than a uniform or a vacc suit, you know."

"Captain," Yosef shook his head, and wagged a finger at the Scout. "I may occasionally indulge in worldly pleasure, but I will thank you not to attempt to tempt me into lust! While it would not be the greater evil of adultery, since I do not believe she is married, it would still be fornication, and very definitely sinful to fantasize."

"I could have almost forgotten you were a priest. Almost!" Kaarin shook his head, not taking offense. "Your religion is way weird, Yosef. Not like the Stellar Church or the Scaladonians or that religious code of honour the Aslan follow. Probably incomprehensible completely to the Vilani."

"You might be surprised that religions similar to the practices of the Vilani have been recorded on Earth – Terra – before spaceflight and quite widespread. Indeed, many of that particular sort of pagan integrated seamlessly into the more mainstream tradition of the chef-priesthood. It's just their similarity to the prevailing mores and beliefs of the decadent Ziru Sirka that makes people mistake them for the Vilani quasi-atheistic shamanism."

"I'm not really that interested in comparative theology, Yosef," Kaarin waved the glass at the priest.

"Suit yourself, friend."

Just then, a chime sounded.

"I think that's the door," said Kaarin, lifted himself out of the pool, wrapped a towel around his waist and went to answer it.

He was met with a man of stark features, wearing an opulent robe – clearly someone important, given the amount of gold embroidery – with a neatly trimmed pointed goatee. Said man was somewhat taken aback by Kaarin's half-nakedness, but recovered quickly.

"I am Chancellor Gaminakkur Managudeli," he introduced himself, "first among the Emperor's advisory council. I wanted to make sure that you were quite comfortable and settled into your quarters. I see I needn't have worried, as you have already found the provided baths."

"We are endlessly grateful for his Imperial Highness' generosity of such mendicants such as ourselves," said Yosef, striding in a bathrobe from the jacuzzi room. "Would you like to come in, Chancellor?"

"I would, indeed."

He strode in as if he owned the place, which probably was not far from fact.

"What can we do for you this day?" asked Yosef. "Is it about the audience?"

"Yes. I will be blunt – I wish to know why you have come here. You were a little cagey with the intermediaries so far, and the Emperor would like to know what is so important. In detail, preferably."

Yosef and Kaarin looked at one another. Kaarin shrugged – not his part of the job, really.

"Very well, then," nodded the diplomat-priest. "We have come with a grave warning and a request for aid."

The Chancellor's eyebrows rose slightly.

"Just over a week ago, the Kingdom of Tyr has been brazenly assaulted by a vanguard flotilla of a warlord who we have determined plans to conquer the Sindalan main, and who knows what else. He styles himself Peter I, Lord Admiral of the New March Fleet. We have reason to believe that he will be coming here, to Caldos, as well as all worlds in the region. Indeed, we even estimate his plans likely to succeed, given the balkanization of the region."

"Interesting. I have not heard of any such warlord," said the Chancellor.

"Then our information is of even greater import, Your Excellence," Yosef continued. "According to our sources, he has a considerable force, augmented by recovered Ancient technology."

"Ancient technology?" the Chancellor seemed dubious. "There is very little of it that even works, after three hundred millennia. He would have to have been exceptionally lucky to find even one artifact in working order, much less enough to provide substantial aid in naval battles. So far, I find this story dubious."

"It is true," Kaarin stated. "We fought their force – one of them had a spinal particle beam! What kind of pirate packs that, but next to no capacity for plunder?"

"And we have recovered substantial communications logs to indicate that this Lord Admiral is a real person, and a very real threat. I have copies of them with me, should you wish to review them."

"Very well. I will send a data clerk for it later," said Gaminakkur uncommitably. "What is this aid you would like to request, should we find your claims probable?"

"A full military alliance to counter the threat," Yosef smacked a fist into an open palm. "We may not have any capital ships available, but it is possible we can rouse enough support from the other Sindallan systems to field a fleet that can counter the incoming invasion force."

"That is quite a request..." The Chancellor exhaled theatrically. "Though I am unconvinced of the truth of your words, I will present a preliminary report to His Imperial Highness, the Emperor. You may get an audience, or you may not. Until then, you are free to stay here as our guests, as promised." He turned towards the door.

"Time is of the essence," Yosef indicated plainly.

"Even time waits for the Emperor," said the Chancellor and left them.

ooo

Kaarin woke in the middle of the long Caldosian night, uncertain why. Grumbling about acclimatization to groundside sleeping, he ventured to relieve himself in the luxurious private lavatory attached to his quarters. Having done his business, he decided it was time for a midnight snack, regardless of whether the actual time was close to local midnight or not.

He heard footsteps.

"That you Yosef?" he said sleepily. "Can't sleep, either?"

It was not Yosef. Neither was it Sai.

Who it was remained a mystery to him at the time, although the outline of a gun aimed in his direction gave him a decent hint as to their intentions. He spun in place, mind racing, inhaling deeply to evoke a great alarming shout – only for his face to meet a pillow, and his arms to be seized by the firm grip of someone else's hands.

Kaarin was not a weakling, especially in comparison with low-gravity worlders, and not yet so old so as to lose his upper body strength – he broke the grip and threw a punch where he guessed there was something punchable, and was pleased to note that his knuckles impacted something softer, followed by a muffled cry of pain.

He ripped the natural-feather pillow from his head.

Then he was shot by the first figure he saw.

ooo

"You look like Hell warmed over, Captain. Here, have a local stim," Yosef poured and handed him a cup of orange fluid. "It cures the gruff, I'm told."

"Unnngh," vocalized Kaarin. He took the cup and sipped at it cautiously, looking through eyes just now beginning to accustom themselves to seeing light. Aside from Yosef, Sai was also there – in remarkably plain civvie clothes, too, which was remarkable, as Kaarin had begun to suspect she only owned uniforms – the two of them having begun breakfast ahead of him. "I feel as though I've been strained through someone's bowels. I had the most awful nightmare."

"Nightmare?" Yosef inquired, munching some toast.

"Yeah. I dreamed I'd woken up in the night, done my business, wanted a snack. I thought I heard you, but it was actually an assassin!" Kaarin conveyed. "With a gun. And there was another one. This one tried to strangle me with a pillow, but I punched him – or her, or it – in the face, I think. But then the other one came close and shot me and I died."

"It's good that it was only a dream, then, sir," Sai said. She had apparently ceased to eat while Kaarin told of his night terror.

"I am unconvinced I am not dreaming myself," commented Yosef, "given your interest in small talk, Ms. Marte."

"I... have dreams too, sir. Terrible ones," the Petty Officer admitted. She definitely did look shaken. "Most nights. Terrible. Incomprehensible."

"A dream's a dream," Kaarin waved it off. Having just woken up from his own little hallucinated misadventure, he wasn't in the moon to hear about someone else's problems with the same. The stim really did help with his terrible case of morning drowsiness, however. "When are we due for an audience? Any word?"

"Not yet. But I think it will be quite soon enough,"

ooo

"The Emperor will see you in five minutes," said the messenger in the afternoon, just following a scrumptious dinner delivered by the palace staff.

"Five minutes?!" exclaimed Yosef. "That's barely enough time to get dressed! Quickly, quickly!"

All in all, they managed pretty well, chucking off their causal clothes and hastily getting into their official get-up. Yosef muttered imprecations at what the world was standing on, if advance notice for an imperial audience consisted of a mere five standard minutes. The messenger waited patiently, then led them forth through the byzantine labyrinth of the Mycian imperial palace, under appropriate escort of four of the Emperor's personal retainers.

"Remember, the proper form of address is one of 'sire', 'His Imperial Highness' or 'His Imperial Majesty, the Emperor'," Yosef reminded them as they went.

"We've been over this a million times already, first on the ship, then here," objected Kaarin. "We'll do fine, since you're the one who will be doing most of the talking."

"This doesn't mean that the Emperor will not want you to answer any questions."

"We are almost there," announced their guide to the halls.

"Get ready. Look respectable, or the best you can do," Yosef once again instructed Kaarin and Sai, and then the doors ahead of them were opened.

If asked about it, Yosef might have compared the throne room of the Mycian Emperor to a Cathedral of his own faith, except the altar blasphemously replaced with the gigantic, gold-and-platinum bedecked royal seat. Stained glass windows a dozen meters high illuminated the great chamber, and columns of marble interspersed themselves between ranks of guardsmen. A small gaggle of courtiers stood on the sides, behind the enforcers.

The procession of Yosef, Kaarin and Sai were led along the length of a red carpet that began at the throne's pedestal. At the other end of that journey, sat the Emperor, Johannes Augustus III, Absolute Ruler of all of Mycia, High King of the Midworld Continent, Head of the Caldosian Stellar Church, Hammer of the Infidels, and a myriad more fancy titles that Yosef expounded on at length during the journey, but which Kaarin found unimpressive – given that they pertained the ruler of not even one full world.

The Emperor himself did not give a good first impression, either. The tailors did a magnificent job of making his faux-military uniform fit him in a way that minimized the display of his obesity, but even they could not perform miracles. And there was nothing they could do to cover the man's weak chin and beady little eyes. Still, according to Yosef, he made an adequate, if not inspired, monarch. Chancellor Gaminakkur was at his side, looking as prestigious and dignified as ever.

"Presenting Father Yosef, Court Chaplain and Envoy from Tyr," a herald announced them when they were closer, "with escort – Imperial Senior Scout Kaarin Sanders and Petty Officer Third Class Sai Marte."

The Emperor lazily motioned them forwards. Yosef bowed deeply, followed closely by Kaarin and Sai.

"We are informed that the King of Tyr wishes to make us aware of certain developments in the subsector," he said formally.

"Yes, Your Imperial Majesty," said Yosef, straightening. Kaarin's back hurt when he did likewise, but he suppressed outward displays of discomfort.

The priest proceeded to lay out the general story of the attack on Tyr, and who was found to be behind it, like he did before to the Chancellor.

"We have provided a copy of the recovered data and sensor logs from the battle for inspection, should there be any doubt to our words."

"Yes. Does it check out, Chancellor?" the Emperor glanced at his advisor.

"My Liege, it appears that-" the man begun to say, but was rudely interrupted by someone shouting:

"He's got a gun!"

Chaos descended upon the court almost immediately. A bunch of guards leaped to protect the Emperor with their own bodies. Women were screaming. Guards flanking the room broke formation. Yosef looked confused; Sai crouched reflexively.

Kaarin's hand went immediately to his hip, where his laser pistol usually resided, only to find it – obviously – absent, since he had surrendered it when they've arrived at the palace. He saw who was shouting now, one of the courtiers, pointing a finger somewhere beyond Kaarin, so the scout's gaze snapped to that point – finding nothing.

Then he was tackled by someone larger than himself. In his long career, he had to resort to fisticuffs on occasion, and even sometimes to the sort of street wrestling that came naturally when two combatants had gotten a bit too close and weren't in a state of mind to fight in a more planned manner. For the second time in a short span of time – but in reality this time – he used his superior, standard gravity musculature to throw off the attacker.

In a split moment before he was rushed by more of them, he was that the man he had chucked to the floor was one of the imperial guardsmen. He froze, uncomprehending, and then was dogpiled, brought low by sheer numbers. He heard shouting and was tazed until he lost consciousness.

ooo

Kaarin's head felt like it there had been a sort of general strike in his brain and the body's governing powers sent in the army to solve the situation one way or another. For that matter, the rest of his physicality did not feel especially good. In fact, his wrists and shoulders felt especially awful. He opened his eyes, finding the light level rather low – still, it was enough to determine that he was hanging from the ceiling, by two chained manacles. Someone had stripped him, and put a drab gray outfit on.

"This had better be another dream," he muttered, trying to remember what happened. They'd been attending an audience with the Mycian Emperor, and then things got a little fuzzy.

He tried moving. Agony was his reward, so he stopped in order to moan loudly, nearly losing consciousness again.

Clearly, something went wrong at the audience. Ah, yes! He remembered. Someone shouted that there was a gun. A woman pointed at someone on the other end of the hall, across from Kaarin – he thought.

Did she actually point at him? That didn't make much sense. He had been disarmed, they all were, when they arrived. Even if he wanted to have a weapon, he had neither the time or connections to secure one once inside the palace. Yet still, he was in some windowless, dimly lit prison cell, hanging from the ceiling by his wrings. This implied that contrary to his assumptions, he apparently had been found to be in possession of a weapon. He wished the world would start making sense.

There was a rattle outside, and the door in front of him opened to reveal a face he already knew.

"Captain," said the Chancellor. "Are you enjoying your new accommodations? They are perhaps not as luxurious as the guest quarters, but they are perhaps more fitting for an assassin."

"Assassin?!" croaked Kaarin. "Don't know what you're talking about. Get me down."

"I'm afraid that will not be possible, Captain. Your attempt on the Emperor's life has failed, you and your comrades in crime have been imprisoned, and all that remains now is to discover what you hoped to accomplish by this blatant, senseless regicide."

"Innocent. I'm innocent!" protested Kaarin, his anger overpowering his pains, seeing the raw smugness of the Chancellor's face.

"I'm sure you think so. Or maybe not," Gaminakkur shrugged. "The interrogators will ferret whatever secrets you are hiding soon enough."

Kaarin ground his teeth, lacking options.

"I'm innocent. You know this. Didn't like the looks of you," he strained to make words leave his mouth against the protestations of his chest, "first I saw you."

"You are only innocent in your dreams, Captain. But this is more of a nightmare than anything else."

Dream. Nightmare. The pieces clicked in his mind and gears turned for the first time today. He hadn't actually dreamt that midnight assault – that actually happened! Somehow, the night stalkers managed to subdue him in a nonlethal way, maybe with a high tech stunner, dragged him back to his bed, so that when he woke up, he'd have little reason to suspect that what he dimly recalled happened in reality. It didn't take much deduction to find the reason for their visit – they planted some kind of weapon on him, not really important what kind, so long as it was small and concealable, something he wouldn't have found himself when he very hastily dressed for the audience.

"That... that was you. You set us up," Kaarin told his oppressor. "You planted the weapon. Had the shouter shout... Made us rush to get dressed."

The Chancellor raised an eyebrow.

"Why, Captain, I didn't know you had such an active imagination! Such a story, spun from whole cloth, on the spot, just having woken up, hanging from the ceiling. I am truly impressed." He clapped.

Kaarin spit at him.

Gaminakkur went ballistic, throwing a haymaker at his gut. It was considerably painful, but not so much compared to the momentarily increased tension on his arms. If anything, the low-gravity worlder seemed to have hurt his hand as well, and stopped himself from making further attacks.

"Guard! Bring the interrogator!" he shouted to the hall. "I want this man tortured until he reveals every little detail of his plot, every co-conspirator."

"Yes, sir!"

As the guard's footsteps echoed along the corridor, the Chancellor turned back to Kaarin. "The Lord Admiral does not like people interfering with his plans, worm. You will die in this pit."

With that, he flounced out of the room, smashing the door behind him.


	6. Chapter 4

They seem to have given up on torturing him for a while. Perhaps to let him recover. Perhaps to make the next session more effective with the effect of anticipation. Kaarin didn't know.

He'd been imprisoned roughly a week – he measured time by the guards' shifts and the regular interrogation sessions. Caldos did not have advanced pharmaceutical technology, or any ability to produce interrogation implants, so they had to rely on skillful individuals with interesting hobbies involving objects both sharp and blunt. They actually were quite proficient; he only lost sight in one eye, only a few ribs were broken, he didn't have any dangerous internal haemorrhages that he knew of. He was even allowed to rest on the floor sometimes, chains extending from the ceiling, given water that he might survive for a little while.

At first, he resolved to tell them nothing. This lasted two sessions, until his self-preservation instincts overruled his determination, and he spilled the truth – that the Chancellor was in cahoots with the Lord Admiral, and that he was unjustly framed. They did not believe him. Growing increasingly desperate, he started making up whatever came to his pain-addled mind, but the interrogators punished him even more severely for saying things that didn't match up with the results of the palace security's own investigation.

Eventually, they seem to have given up. He was given some food in addition to his ration of water. His paranoia had grown explosively during his incarceration. Kaarin had been in jail before, on minor offences related to starport pubs, but never this long, and never tortured for information. A first for everything, he thought grimly. Is this how he was going to end? Would he rot until his death in some barbarian gaol, forgotten by everyone... until the warlord came, conquering and smashing, doubtless having little consideration for the lives of prisoners who happen to be sharing the location with seats of power.

"No," Kaarin said to himself. "I will not. I will not!"

"You will not what?" asked a quasi-familiar voice. For a moment, Kaarin thought it was the Chancellor again, but when the door opened, it was the Emperor himself who came into his cell, in all his expansive glory. A pair of retainers flanked the door inside.

Karin stood, chains rattling. "Sire! Your Chancellor, he-"

"-framed you to remove your delegation from the equation. Yes, yes, I know. I can't say I approve of his methods. He could have notified me, for one," the sovereign harrumphed. "Still, he does what is good for the realm."

"But the warlord-"

"I know about the warlord, this 'Lord Admiral'. Surprised?"

Kaarin certainly was. "I don't understand."

"Yes, that's what a lot of people don't. I had been already contacted by Lord Peter, through his agents. And I must say, he has given me a lot to think about. To rule this entire world, all that power, at my fingertips, should I accept a cession of the starport and a plot of land around it to him. I was skeptical, at first, but then you came. So it is true that he has Ancient artifacts of some sort, and in working order too. Extraordinary."

The Emperor smiled, gleefully, greedily. Kaarin wanted to punch him in his fat lip.

"If you knew all this, why have me tortured?"

"I knew, but I wasn't sure. The torture of you and your companions was actually Gaminakkur's idea. He's usually right about such things, though." The Emperor shrugged. "I would actually let you go, but he thinks that we could get something in barter for you, from the Lord Admiral."

"You bastard!"

"You know I could have you tortured again, for lese majeste?"

Kaarin shut up.

"Well, I'm glad we had this talk."

The Emperor turned around on his heels and strode out of the cell.

ooo

Kaarin paced in circles, for the last several days. He did not have anything else to do in his two-by-two cell. Couldn't look out the window, because there was none. The door did not have a window either, just some ventilation slips. The 'toilet' was just a cavity in the floor in the corner, covered by a plastic lid, and entertainment by looking into its contents was unlikely.

So was escape, for that matter. If he were a Darrian midget, it might have been possible to use the latrine hole – if he believed the Mycians were stupid enough to have that lead anywhere remotely resembling 'freedom'. Picking the lock was made troublesome by the absence of a pickable lock – as far as he could tell, the door was opened automatically through some electrical system located elsewhere. Tunneling through the walls was made more difficult by the fact that the cell was apparently made of reinforced concrete slabs; even if he could chip the stonelike substance away, he would likely have to contend with metal bars embedded in it, and he had no way to get through that.

Another problem were the manacles. They never came off – his gaolers just extended them or drew them back in, as they needed, probably via a similar conveyance as the door worked on. In any escape situation, he'd need to either get them off – fortunately, unlike the door they were equipped with simple mechanical locks that he could get out of, provided a piece of thin metal or plastic. The only challenge was to obtain such.

After mentally enumerating the difficulties, he began formulating his plan – decades in the Scouts meant that he'd acquired a habit of not multiplying problems unnecessarily. If he were to escape, it had to be during one of the now-infrequent visitations. One day, the guards were going to slip up somehow, and Kaarin would be able to use that to his advantage. Perhaps he could strangle a guard with the manacle chain, without anyone else noticing? The cell did not include any cameras – apparently, the locals did not master miniaturized electronics yet. He hoped.

Footsteps sounded outside, along with the regular noise of tiny wheels moving along a concrete floor. Food delivery, most likely, given the time.

The door clacked, locks releasing, and opened.

"Your dinner, Sanders," said the guard outside, looking in.

Kaarin noted that the delivery man was a new guy, different from the one who usually gave him the slop they had the audacity to call 'food'. He rolled the cart by the door, took a tray and a bowl, and slapped a couple of ladles into the container, and went it, as Kaarin waited, leaning against the back wall. He could maybe take the guy hostage, but it was a bit doubtful whether they'd care about the life of a menial worker.

Said worker placed the tray next to Kaarin on the plywood 'bed'. Normally, he'd take the used tray away, but instead, he leaned in to the prisoner's ear.

"Pretend to strangle me," he said, almost too quiet to make out.

"Huh?" Kaarin replied, dumbfounded.

"Pretend to strangle me," repeated the stranger.

Kaarin did not need to be told thrice. With a low growl, his hands seized the other's neck, but in a way that didn't actually cause the supposed victim to have reduced airflow. The man started to vocalize as if he was choked.

"The fuck is going on in there," said the guard, noticing something amiss. He strode in, armed with a baton. "Let him go, bitch!"

The guard smacked Kaarin's arm from the side, unwilling to hit the delivery man on the head accidentally. Kaarin let go, grunting in completely genuine pain. He fell back into the corner, as the guard pushed the erstwhile strangulation victim behind him.

"Don't like the food, Sanders? How about some whoopass instead?"

The guard raised the baton to strike at him again, but stopped suddenly when the one he was defending pressed a cloth into his face from behind. Predictably, he inhaled, eyes going wide – and collapsed after a couple of seconds struggling.

"I don't know who you are – but thanks anyway," said Kaarin, elated at the unexpected help. "You're here to break me out?"

The stranger was already rifling through the guard's keychain. "Yes. Here, unlock yourself," he tossed him a jangling bunch of keys.

"What do I call you?" Kaarin asked, working through the keys one by one, until he found the one that did work on the manacles. Meanwhile, the other man was stripping the unconscious guard of everything worthwhile – gun, wallet, identification card, handcuffs, baton.

"Arthur. Can you run, Sanders?"

"After a fashion," replied Kaarin, rubbing his wrists. "Where are we running to?"

"Nowhere right now. That's a contingency," Arthur said, unveiling the underside of the cart, revealing it mostly empty. He dumped the guard's belongings there. "Get in. I'll roll you out, but there's no guarantee we'll make it out the whole way like this. When I tell you to run, do so."

"Got it." Kaarin took a seat in the tray mobile. "What about my friends?"

"Don't worry about them."

"I'm not leaving without my friends!" protested Kaarin.

"I said – don't worry about them," insisted Arthur, closing the door and beginning to roll the cart down the hallway. "They're already being liberated as we speak. You're the only one in the high security block, they were deemed lower security risks and put elsewhere."

Reassured, Kaarin settled into being illegal cargo.

From within the veiled interior, he had only a limited perception on the events outside his temporary lodgings, but enough light to arm himself. Given his greater strength, he would probably have a decent chance in hand-to-hand combat, especially armed, but he hoped it wouldn't come to that. He also had the liberated slug pistol – with just one eye, long distance accuracy was going to be horrible, but these weapons had a very short effective range even in the hands of uncrippled users.

His heartbeat was elevated, given the circumstances, and it was very difficult being quiet – not wheezing, not moving his weight around. Still, he did the best he could as Arthur rolled his escape vehicle along several corridors, got them into a lift and went up. Soon, they were rolling along on concrete floors again.

"Give me the guard's access card," his liberator demanded, shoving a hand under the cloth, and Kaarin complied. Something beeped. The cart rolled onwards.

"Hey, you!" a voice sounded from a distance. "Where the hell are you going with that cart?"

"Out to the garage to have the wheels oiled. They creak a lot," Arthur replied, slowing down.

"They don't sound creaky to me."

"Come here and listen then. It's maddening from up close."

Kaarin heard footsteps coming over. He gripped the pistol harder and swallowed.

"Hear it now?"

"As a matter of fact, no. You got some Vargr in you, fella? I don't hear a thing."

"It's the front wheel. Just lean in and you'll hear it too!" insisted Arthur.

"Okay, hearing-ear dog, look here-"

Sounds of struggle began outside his tiny world.

"Help! Alarm!" shouted the investigator.

Kaarin decided that hiding time was over. In a smooth motion, he rolled out from under the cart, to see Arthur struggling to put a cloth over a guard's face, and the guard not letting him get away with that. Kaarin double tapped him in the legs.

The guard screamed and the sudden painful distraction gave Arthur the upper hand he needed and finally managed to put the chemical-soaked rag onto the other man's air intake. He stopped struggling very quickly.

"This way! Run!" Arthur sprinted onwards.

They were in some sort of small courtyard, albeit one closed from the top by a barred glass ceiling. Kaarin took off after his benefactor, in one hand gripping the baton, in the other, the pistol.

"Halt!" came from behind them. Kaarin didn't look around to identify who was shouting, but it became clear enough immediately, as shots rang out and impacted the door they were racing towards. Arthur was there fist, and smashed into it shoulder-first. Fortunately, the building was not fire safety-compliant and they both ran into the room beyond before they could be shot.

It was a garage, just as Arthur described their destination to the guard. Aside from stalls and a limited automobile workshop, there were some vehicles that reminded Kaarin of recreational buggies from a garden world he visited once.

"Open that door!" yelled Arthur. "Use the red button!"

Kaarin complied, running over to the closed exit, and smashing the red button next to it. The banded covering began to raise, far too slowly for Kaarin's taste. Meanwhile, Arthur jumped into one of the buggies, started it and wheeled around to meet Kaarin at the exit.

A pair of guardsmen emerged from the door they've used to get into the garage. Kaarin noticed them and opened fire immediately, causing them to dive for cover.

"It's open enough! Get in!" Arthur said, and Kaarin jumped into the passenger's seat.

As his driver put the pedal to the metal, Kaarin emptied the magazine providing suppression fire against their cowering pursuers. In seconds, they were in a downwards-winding tunnel, safe from immediate retaliation.

ooo

"Where are we going?" Kaarin asked, as they drove onto flat interior terrain again.

"This is part of a nuclear shelter system," explained Arthur, parking the buggy and jumping out to throw a lever. A giant metal door began to slide to the side, propelled by a whirring motor. "It was built after the Mycians and their enemies became capable of building nuclear weapons. There are hundreds of kilometers of underground tunnels, between critical locations in the city, including the palace and the starport."

"The starport! Yes! Is my ship intact? Is it fueled up?"

"Your ship is fine, Sanders, it's fueled up and ready to go at a moment's notice. It might be under guard, but security is very likely light. I don't know much more."

Arthur knelt down near the motor powering the door and did something Kaarin could not properly see. The door managed to get open all the way, and the rescuer threw the lever the other way, before sprinting back to the buggy as the slab of metal began to close. He drove through it with time to spare.

"Is it worth the effort to close the door? We lose about as much time having to close it as just driving through it just after it opens up enough," Kaarin said.

"Wait for it."

"Wait for what?"

There was an explosion behind them. Kaarin jumped and looked behind – he saw only the closed door.

"Plastic explosive. Not too powerful, but enough to disable a crude motor. They will have to waste substantial amounts of time to open that door if they wish to pursue us the way we came in," Arthur explained.

"Damn, this operation is more intricately planned than I expected," said Kaarin. "I don't know what I expected, really. Just who are you?"

"Now is not the time."

"This tunnel goes on longer than I can see!" Kaarin pointed ahead. Indeed, the other end was too miniscule to make out. "Who are you? Why are you breaking me out?"

Arthur was silent for a little while.

"Imperial Intelligence," he said, finally.

"Imperial... you meant the Third Imperium? Not this petty realm."

"Indeed. We have reason to believe that your continued freedom and accomplishment of your mission on behalf of the Tyrian government is a net benefit to the interests of the Imperium. Therefore, it behooves us to free you and send you on your way," explained the covert agent.

Kaarin had a good look at the man who rescued him for the first time since they've met. In fact, if he were to study Arthur's – if that even was his real name – features at length, he would have trouble remembering anything about him. Everything about him was average, non-descript, average height, average built, average hair. He had a certain shiftiness about him, if one studied him intently, an alert sort of focus – but otherwise, any warrants for his arrest could well include an ethnicity composite instead of a likeness for all the good it would do.

"Well, I'll be damned," Kaarin shook his head. "I never really believed the Three-Eye would stick up for me."

"To be clear: Your particular well-being is of secondary importance, Sanders. It's just that you happen to be important to certain events the Imperium would like to occur, and some which it would prefer to preclude happening." Arthur paused. "You're welcome, Sanders."

Kaarin laughed.

ooo

"Last stop, everybody out," the imperial agent announced, when they pulled up against the tentative end of the corridor. It continued in two other directions, left and right, but there was a door at the center of the T-intersection. Kaarin noticed that the lock had been destroyed with some kind of heat-based tool, like a blowtorch or fusion cutter. Arthur plowed past the door, barely pausing to push it open. Kaarin followed him in and up the staircase.

They came up to a sort of dusty lobby, to a welcoming committee.

"Captain! I knew you were alive!" exclaimed Yosef.

The priest wasn't looking too good, sporting some bruises on his face, and wore the same prison garb as Kaarin did. Aside from him, there were two others – one was Sai, who had two black eyes and her hair chopped up unevenly, close to the skin – and the other was a man in the uniform of a Mycian imperial guardsman. Kaarin aimed the stolen gun at him, to a mutual reciprocation from him.

"Stand down, Captain," Yosef said. "He's on our side. Same side as the man who came with you," he indicated Arthur.

Kaarin relaxed, and put the gun down. "I'm out of bullets, anyway. What's the situation? Where are we?" He noticed more details now – Yosef and Sai were armed with slug pistols too, and all three of them had respirators hanging at their necks.

"The starport exit of the nuclear tunnel system," answered the fake guardsman. "Security's been alerted, but they haven't received reinforcements yet. This won't last. If you want to get to your ship, the time is now. The ship's berth is three slots from here, once you're out of the building. Be quick and stealthy, and you might just get to it alive."

"Let's go, then!" Kaarin exclaimed, turning towards the door.

"Captain! This belongs to you, I believe," the faux-guard handed him his miniaturized laser pistol and power pack. "And take this, too," he took off his respirator as well.

"Thanks, man, I owe you one."

"Don't mention it. To anyone," said he, and turned towards the staircase. "I'll slow them down below. Arthur, get them to safety."

"Will do," replied Arthur, opening the interior door of the airlock leading outside. "After me. Be quiet, follow me, don't open fire unless there's a firefight already going on."

The three of them followed him out.

ooo

The outside turned out to be a nasty place, perhaps unsurprisingly, given the very thin atmosphere that wrapped Caldos. Kaarin, Yosef and Sai put the respirators on their faces, but it was still a horrible experience to go from relatively standard pressure to something that was fairly close to vacuum in a span of time measured in seconds. Kaarin's working and non-working eye both felt like they were going to explode.

They were truly back at the starport, which Kaarin had no opportunity to explore after they landed. It was similar to what he'd seen in Imperial space and in the frontier, a collection of administration buildings, a communication center, loading and off-loading cranes and trucks, and plenty of poured-concrete landing spaces. At the moment, there was an utterly huge, multi-kiloton freighter parked on the pad nearest them, blocking a lot of the view.

Arthur led the way, which gave Kaarin enough information to find the 'Imminent Misjump', standing where he set it down the couple of weeks before.

"It's them! Stop them!" came a shout from the side. They'd been spotted.

"Run!" shouted Arthur, following his own advice.

Kaarin thought better of it, in the present circumstances of being in relatively open terrain – the buildings on their right did not provide any cover, and the chainlink fence between them and the berth with the big freighter could not be counted to stop bullets, even if it could delay pursuit.

He stopped and found the shouter – one of three guards ducking under the belly of the behemoth cargo ship. Kaarin fired off a few beams at them, the only sound produced being a faint 'zot' from the pistol's electrical components discharging, and was pleased to hear cries of pain. This would cover their retreat for a little while, as the pursuers were temporarily demoralized. Only then did he follow the others, who'd already put several meters distance on him.

"Wait for me!" he breathed, too quietly for them to hear and fell into a dead-out run.

Shots rang out when they cleared the freighter, streaming in from a guard tower situated on the other side of the starport, perforating the sides of the buildings alongside which they were running. Kaarin redoubled his efforts – running targets were quite difficult to hit, after all, and faster running targets better than slower running ones.

Fifty meters to the scoutship.

A window exploded to his side, spraying glass everywhere.

Forty meters.

Bullets chipped away at the concrete next to his feet.

Thirty meters.

Kaarin was getting short of breath, the respirator apparatus not helping in the least.

Twenty meters.

He saw who was shooting at them – there was a manned guard tower on the other side of the starport. It was too far away to see clearly, but they had a crew-operated slug thrower over there. Kaarin cursed internally. The only saving grace was that these kinds of weapons weren't meant to be accurate – for suppression, primarily, not kills.

Ten meters.

Arthur, Yosef and Sai hugged the scoutship's door while the engineer frantically tapped the entry console with the access combination.

Five meters.

Kaarin felt as if someone had thrown a rock at his side. He was already falling over, carried by momentum, as he realized that he had been shot. His limp body tumbled forward, giving him an unwelcome taste of the tarmac.

"Help me!" he heard Arthur's voice yell. Seconds later, he was lifted up from the ground by the imperial agent and someone else – Yosef, he thought. "Crap! Get him in, get him in!"

Consciousness was fading. Curiously, the pain he felt was very limited. His face hurt like hell, he must have scraped it pretty bad. One of his hands burned, too, more abrasions, probably. But the rest – not really. Kaarin tried to speak, but only unintelligible gargling came out, along with a metallic taste, which he knew from previous experiences – blood in his mouth.

"Shut the door!" Arthur commanded. "Fire up the P-plant and the M-drive!"

"Yes, sir!" came Sai's voice.

Kaarin heard bullets impacting on the ship's hull – uselessly. Starship armour could take a hit from a tank, and be none worse for wear. Anti-personnel munitions were utterly pointless, even against unarmoured hulls, and the 'Imminent Misjump' had a layer of crystaliron.

Yosef and Arthur dragged him by his hands into the common area.

"Flip him over," Yosef suggested, as they put him down on the floor. From here, Kaarin had a beautiful view of the ceiling. It was painted a different colour from the floor, just in case artificial gravity failed, and you had to know which way was up. He felt pretty blissful, all told, cares about pertinent things falling away.

The priest's face drifted into his vision.

"Can you hear me, Captain?" he asked.

Kaarin responded with a grunt and tried to smile. He wasn't sure of he'd succeeded or not.

The priest swore.

Kaarin lost consciousness.

ooo

Arthur wasn't his real name, of course, just a pseudonym he'd chosen for this operation. He'd had many before, and expected to have many yet – provided they get out of this one with their hides intact. In order to achieve this, he had to get them off the planet, and the regular pilot was out of commission. Fortunately, his impressively wide skillset included starship piloting. Once the power plant came online and the maneuver drive revved up, he wasted no time making a vertical takeoff at approximately three and a half effective gravities – a welcome surprise that the ship has been refit from the standard drive which packed only half this boot.

"Diplomat, get useful," he shouted. "Plot us a jump to the Dostoevsky system."

"Hold your horses! I don't know how to plot jumps or anything like that," objected Yosef. "Can't you do it?"

"I'm busy dodging bullets and will be busy dodging lasers."

"Can't Sai Marte do it?"

"If she knows how. Doesn't matter. I don't care, so long as it's done," Arthur waved him off.

They were in orbit mighty fast, compared to chemical-powered thrusters the industrial base of the planet could just barely produce. Immediately, he had to contend with angry demands to return to port or be destroyed – he shut down the comm lest it distract him. Then came the actual laser beams, low-powered discount ones coming from several small ships the one-third of the Caldosian economy managed to buy them, and a few from the Mycian planetary point-defense satellites. The latter he could ignore. The former, he would better dodge, even if they were unlikely to cause much harm against even a lightly armoured starship, which this was.

The engineer stalked onto the bridge.

"Sir, I need a point to plot the jump from," she said simply.

"Here," Arthur pointed to the astrogation display. "Jump-2 to Dostoevsky, minimum safe distance from gravwell, current heading."

Astrogation was one of those tasks which were relatively straighforward, but required lots of tedious calculations, yet were difficult to offload on a computer. A computer could check if the calcs were correct, but only a trained human could avoid having to brute force the entire domain of possible answers.

They were raked by a laser from one of the Mycian SDBs. Arthur checked the automated damage report – nothing major, just some superheated armour and hull. They'd live. Of course, it would take the better part of two hours to make it to the jump limit. They might not be able to weather the storm quite so long.

"Diplomat!" he called again, as he multitasked avoiding stray shots and the engineer was busy crunching numbers.

"My given name is Yosef, and my title is 'Father', or if you prefer my secular rank, 'envoy'," the priest complained. "What can I do for you, Arthur?"

"Can you operate a laser turret?"

"I've never tried."

"Get up into the turret, grab the controls, try to align the crosshair with the red rhombuses on the display. When you do, press both red buttons," the agent gave him a crash course in starship gunnery. "We're relying on you to prevent our destruction by hostile forces, but no pressure."

"You have got to get a course in diplomacy," muttered Yosef and drew down the ladder that led into the turret on top of the scoutship. A minute or so later, he begun shooting – not accurately, but credibly trying to harm the enemy.

The engineer was ready with a set of astrogation parameters in thirty minutes of sweaty grinding away at troublesome numbers – but Arthur heard the telltale sad beep the automated checker made when the calculations were incorrect.

"Do it over, same departure point," he instructed.

Meanwhile, their amateur gunner had enough success to actually score a hit on one of the Mycians' hundred-tonner patrol boats. That one disengaged from the fight, but the other five redoubled their efforts. Fortunately, distance was on their side, and Arthur could veer away from any likely beam trajectories – it also made Yosef's job harder, but Arthur did not actually expect that cleric to hit anything, so he was already ahead on that front.

The woman produced a second set of numbers, some forty minutes after the first set, and plugged them in.

Another sad beep.

"Did you actually do this before?" Arthur demanded.

"Once successfully, sir," she said.

"Do it again, but for real this time," he waved an arm in her general direction without turning from his own task.

A decompression alarm sounded – not good. If they started losing air, they'd have to suit up, which they hadn't done so far, due to their haste and necessity to do other things rather than take ten minutes to attach everything.

"Leaking air in the cargo bay, sealing off the lower deck," Arthur announced. "How are you doing with those numbers?"

"I'm working, sir."

"Work faster."

"I'm trying, sir."

A scream came from the upper deck – which consisted only of the turret controls, narrowing down the location of the problem, whatever it was. Arthur always kept his cool, never panicked, but this situation was increasingly trying both his nerves and his patience. This crew was incompetent.

"Status report, diplomat!"

"The controls have gone bad! I can't make heads or tails of them, everything is sluggish and I can't get the crosshair pointed where I want it!" came a plea from the turret.

"The turret's probably been hit, keep trying," he shouted back. "The jump limit is coming up in six minutes, where are those numbers?" If they missed it, she'd have to start all over again, and the way things were going, they might not have that long. Their gunner got lucky only once, and by now they've been roughed up pretty severely by the opposition.

"Numbers, sir," the woman said, and started plugging them into the computer a third time.

Arthur almost let his composure drop when he heard the happy beep of an accepted astrogation route.

"Get to the jump drive and I hope you're a better engineer than you're an astrogator," he said.

"I am, sir," she went away at a run.

"Jump in three minutes," Arthur counted down the time. "Two minutes. One minute. Thirty seconds. Is everything ready?"

"Ready, sir!" came an answer from engineering via the intercom.

"Engage when green."

The seconds counted down, appearing to take their sweet time about it, then hit zero. Power output fluctuated massively. The main viewport turned blue.

They were in jump space.


	7. Chapter 5

Yosef stood over the cryoberth, subvocalizing while fiddling with a beaded necklace of sorts. A theologian might have identified his occupation as praying, which is what it was, but unfortunately, he was the only one on board. They'd been in jump for half an hour now, and all of the emergencies have been dealt with. They were no longer leaking air, the ship's systems which took hits have been patched up enough to get them through the week, work mostly done by Sai Marte.

"How is Sanders?" the agent asked, striding into the common room.

"Frozen," Yosef replied, stowing the beads reluctantly. "He was still breathing when we put him on ice."

"Good. That means he'll probably keep until we hit Dostoevsky, provided the power doesn't fail."

"Wouldn't that also mean that we die?"

"Oh, yes. If power fails, the jump bubble collapses and we get eaten by jumpspace," the agent shrugged. "Hard to say what really happens when something goes wrong during jump. People just don't come back. The rare few who do just suffer catastrophic dislocation – the jump bubble doesn't actually fail during transit, but there are anomalies in the jump drive's function, which can be taken as a hint that you'd better start thinking what you're going to do when you come out two parsecs from the nearest star system and with no fuel for another jump."

"You sound like you speak from experience, mister Arthur," Yosef noted.

"I do indeed. I have had the complete lack of pleasure to misjump non-catastrophically once, and I hope never to repeat the experience."

"You've survived and became enriched by the experience, I expect. Speaking of survival. I've noticed that you neglected to bring a respirator when we the run of our lives back there on Caldos. Yet you didn't seem to hold your breath, or be otherwise negatively affected."

Arthur smiled. "I have many talents, and even more secrets," he said. "Anyway. The ship will keep, there's little reason to keep watch on the bridge until the expected jump exit nears. I'm going to catch a nap, because I haven't slept in thirty hours. Good night."

The imperial agent went off, briefly appraising the available staterooms before choosing the vacant one, and retiring.

"It's probably a lung implant, sir," said Sai Marte, exiting engineering. Her face was coated with grease, adding to the marks of abuse.

"Oh. That makes sense. Do you think he's otherwise enhanced?"

"Can't say, sir. I would need to perform a number of full-body scans to determine with reasonable certainty the complete list of modifications he may have."

"Well, let's not dwell on that." Yosef paused. "Do you think he's trustworthy, Ms. Marte?"

"I... I don't know, sir. He did break us out of prison."

"That is a considerable point in his favour, and will let me sleep at night, at least. I wish Kaarin didn't get shot. It's funny." Yosef chuckled softly. "I've known him for a week at best, and still would have liked his appraisal of our new friend."

"He is the Captain. He's the leader, sir," said Sai Marte.

"I guess he is that. Right now he's a popsicle, I'm afraid, and we'll have to deal without him. Think we can do that?"

"Yes, sir!"

"Good, good. Let's follow the agent's lead and get some shut-eye. I don't know about you, but I'll be well-pleased to sleep on something that wasn't designed to inflict discomfort while technically fitting the bare requirements to be a place of rest. Good night, Ms. Marte."

"Good night, sir."

ooo

"I've been meaning to ask, Mr. Arthur," preambled Yosef. "What is it that you think we are supposed to do now?"

The three of them were sitting in the common area, around breakfast. Shipboard meals tended to be prepackaged, ready-to-eat affairs prepared with the aid of a microwave cooker. The 'Imminent Misjump' was no exception in this regard, the meals the trio ate consisting of warmed-over nutrient paste, dry crackers and optionally stim, favored by Arthur and Yosef, or water, favored by Sai.

"Whatever you were supposed to do, obviously," the agent said. "You were sent to get aid for your government to stop a conquering warlord from turning the Sindalian main into his personal playground. I suggest you continue with that mission. Since we're going to Dostoevsky, you can ask the government there, and the Imperial forces stationed to protect the research base."

"It won't hurt, no. But I think you're also holding out on us."

"Me?" Arthur looked perfectly surprised and innocent.

"You're an Imperial agent who operated until recently in the heart of the Mycian empire, whose high echelons were apparently contacted by the Lord Admiral's forerunners – that's what I inferred from my interrogation. Too many specific questions, too many slipped details we ourselves did not know and therefore couldn't tell them. What do you know of him?"

The imperial agent stared at Yosef in silence for nearly a minute before he decided to reply.

"The Lord Admiral is the issue of the Duchess of Mora. That particular Imperial vassal realm is governed according to an enatic succession scheme – only females may inherit the duchy. Other titles are handed out as the Duchess sees fit, but substantially also follow a daughters-first line of inheritance. This is quite unusual, and only practiced in that region of space."

"Understood. Agnatic, I believe, is common, as are male-preference laws," said Yosef, showing some familiarity with matters of royal succession.

"Correct. So Peter of Mora, firstborn of Her Excellency the Duchess of Mora was set from birth to inherit nothing."

"But he wouldn't accept that, I assume," Yosef guessed.

"Also correct. The details of his early life are sketchy, due to the most recent Paliquean Miner Revolt, the third I believe. He got posted as an administrator there and worked his way up the management of ducal interests there. Sometime later, for reasons unclear, he left his family there and went off to be a spacer on a free trader's ship – this we have adequate records of. He completed a couple of tours, before going into the business himself, buying his mother's yacht and hiring a motley band of cutthroats, vagabonds and other criminals, in order to try his hand at getting rich quick."

"Piracy?" Sai took interest.

"Actually, no. That's one of the interesting parts. He apparently made a killing trading in the Trin and Glisten subsectors, radioactives and other rare elements. According to our records, he never once did anything remotely criminal during that time."

"It must have been quite a feat, with the crew you described him having," Yosef raised a couple of eyebrows.

"Assuming our data is accurate, not spotty and not doctored. In any case, this is where it gets interesting. The miner revolt blows up, and the miners issue a bounty on his head, since he's the duchess' son and also part of the corporate government they're rebelling against – a decent hostage to barter for getting out of the whole rebellion alive, as opposed to slaughtered by Imperial response."

"Did they catch him?"

"Oh, they tried. They tried hard. He destroyed seven ships on three separate occasions, and the bounty went up every time. Our regional representative marked him as a person of greater interest around that time. Lord Peter, upon learning what was happening, which was actually months after the incident that started the insurgency on Palique – you know, normal stuff, what with interstellar travel times – but he dropped everything and raced back home."

"Why would- oh! His family, yes, I can see why now."

"You're a quick learner. If circumstances were different, I might have offered you a job in the Intelligence service."

"No, thank you, I already have a calling, and a vocation. I would also rather stay out of being occupationally required to violate the laws of morality. You were saying that the Lord Admiral raced home to rescue his wife and children?"

"Indeed. Well, he got there, smashed his way in through the miner blockade and got his dependents off the world. I believe that at this time, he also swapped his ship to a prize he'd captured while defending himself from bounty hunters. Again, Paliquean records are almost non-existent of the event. He did hire some additional crew for the larger vessel, and allegedly went off to request aid from his mother at Mora. But..."

"But?"

"We lost track of him entirely there. It took him nine months to reach Mora."

"Mora is six parsecs away from Palique," said Sai, looking the information up on her datapad.

"Correct. He resurfaced on our radar nine months later, being inspected by customs at Jewell."

"Where is that, Ms. Marte?"

"Jewell is approximately thirty parsecs from Mora, spinward and coreward. It's on the Consulate border, sir."

"The marine who interrogated him got a story about a misjump from him. It seems vaguely likely, but it would make his particular anomalous leap the farthest is recorded history. He allegedly ended up deep in Zhodani territory and managed to return to Imperial space by hook or crook. Of course, this story was so fantastic that a more thorough check was done. Turned out he's taken in Imperial refugees on his way back, including a former researcher accused of treason and a known felon – both of whom misjumped into Consulate space; a likely story. The data is classified even for me – I don't have anything but the authenticity hashes – but somehow, he extracted leniency from the judge. They only got turned over to him and exiled from the planet."

"Treason against the Imperium merits a local exile?"

"Again, the details are on a need-to-know basis only. If I don't need to know, you sure as hell don't need to know. Anyways, the official information is that they've found some alien technology on board his ship, which was by then heavily modified. He said that they'd encountered an unidentified vessel in deep space, destroyed it, and pillaged it for parts. Lacking technical expertise, the inspection party let that slide."

"That would be the Ancient technology he is rumoured to have? What did he do next?"

"He made a series of quick jumps to Mora, to find the Duchess absent. On the way, he acquired a used two-thousand ton freighter. We believe it was in Rhylanor, but the erraticness of his behaviour made his moves hard to predict and track. He spent quite some time investigating and using his charms to find her location just rimward of Palique. You see, the Third Paliquean Miner Revolt was still ongoing. The miners used subterfuge to disable an Imperial cruiser sent to guard the planet and were slowly working their way through the subterranean habitats."

"It's a wonder these events don't penetrate the public awareness. I have never heard of Palique, or its revolts before now."

"It's a tiny, isolated, utterly insignificant local uprising, compared to the size of the Imperium. Apparently, the Lord Peter never gave up on his plan of crushing the rebellion for slights against him – we have a broadcast of his on record, captured via jump-lightspeed interception-"

"It's where you jump into the path of emissions travelling at lightspeed, picking them up long after the fact, sir," Sai explained to Yosef.

"-where he indignantly berates a rebel leader for setting the initial bounty on his head to such an insultingly low value – and the equally intolerable endangerment of his family. You have to understand, all this time, our records indicate that he's making a killing doing speculative trading, acquiring resources. By the time he's at Mora, he's loaded with cash, and turns the freighter he bought into a warship. He's upgrading himself, too. Medical records we've obtained have him enhanced with more bionics, cyberware and consumer- and military-grade augments than you can shake a stick at. We're not sure if he still thinks quite the way like a pure-strain human does, with all that junk in his brain."

Sai winced. Arthur ignored her.

"He goes to Palique again. And – guess what?"

"You lose track of him again?"

"Indeed. He resurfaces at Palique without having gone to where he is logged as going. Utterly demolishes the miner fleet, nukes their asteroid bases, and begins a campaign of methodical orbital bombardment until his mother arrives with Imperial reinforcements from Nexine."

"He didn't demand the rebels surrender?"

"He did. I believe the phrase he used was, verbatim, 'Surrender now and I'll only execute your leaders.' He only transmitted this once, demanded a reply, didn't get it, and began raining death at everything the remaining Paliquean forces indicated was in the hands of the rebels."

"Interesting fellow. So what happened after the Duchess relieved him?"

"We lack that information – blocked by the ducal services. Some of the dukes are ornery fellows, objecting to being spied upon and having their own intelligence agents. He's not quite done yet topping himself in terms of what one man can accomplish."

"As if he wasn't some kind of heroic adventurer, inspiration to all small-time independent ship captains all this time?"

"Exactly. Once again, we lose track of him. He turns up on the Imperial frontier just a couple of subsectors Spinward, but our information is fragmented, incomplete and contradictory here. The best we can determine, is that he conquered the independent world of Pagaton using a combination of subterfuge, superior technology and orbital control. From there, he went on to found a short-lived polity called the 'Pagaton March'. In short order, he conquers every system in the area that the Imperium doesn't claim in one way or another – precluding a good reason to intervene – and is only stopped when the Sword Worlders object to his one-man imperialism. He is defeated five years ago, and drops off the radar until about six months ago, in the Belgardian Sojurnate, heading rimward."

"Heading here."

"That's what I know about him," Arthur concluded. "Does this change your plans in any way?"

"Well, no, but it gives us an improved psychological profile that we did not have before," Yosef said. "We knew he's madly ambitious and possessed of incredible determination, but is short-tempered and cruelly inclined towards his enemies. He obviously cares about his family, though – whatever happened to them?"

"As far as my latest information is concerned, they are still on Mora. His eldest son would be about fifteen now, the daughter about twelve, and his youngest four. Since they're under the protection of the Duchess, we don't really have direct access to them."

"I hope not. What would you do? Kidnap them and hold them hostage against him?"

"Not a bad idea, priest!" Arthur smiled.

"I'm not giving you any ideas you didn't already have. I am resolved to stop this man, but to resort to evil in order to do so is out of the question. Victory is meaningless if achieved by treachery," Yosef asserted.

The agent stood up, finished with his meal some time ago in the telling.

"We're going to have to agree to disagree on that one. The point is moot. In the meantime, practice your speeches. You and I both want your purpose to succeed. If you'll excuse me, I'm going to have something I can rarely afford – a nap."

Yosef shook his head at the Imperial, who retired to his stateroom.

"Sir?"

"Something on your mind, Ms. Marte?"

"Yes, sir. Can the Captain be healed?"

Yosef opened his mouth, then closed it again. "Good question. People don't usually survive such wounds as he received," he said honestly. "We've got him on ice – God bless him for having that thing installed – so his metabolism is slowed down enough that he might be good until the end of our voyage, and we can turn him over to a hospital. I guess it depends how advanced the medical facilities on Dostoevsky are. If they're as good as the ones we have on Tyr... it's possible. But even healthy people not always survive being cryonically frozen and then thawed. If I were a betting man, I wouldn't bet on him. Luckily, I'm a man of the cloth, so I can instead pray for his life – which I encourage you to do also."

"Yes, sir! Understood, sir!"


	8. Chapter 6

Kaarin woke with a start, met with darkness. He sat up on his bed – not the stateroom cot, too soft, too large. His eyes adjusted to the darkness a bit, revealing light coming from an open door in from of the bed. Confused, he fumbled out of the covers. The air was chill and deathly still.

He stepped into something soft and fuzzy – a child's toy. No, not just any toy, as Kaarin realized when he picked it up. It was Mr. Cat, his old stuffed toy, when he was but a boy. He looked at himself, in the pale light filtering through the doorway, and froze with horror – he was a child, scarcely more than ten. Was this a dream? Was his up-until-now spacegoing career a dream? Did he dream the assassins in the night? Were they real? Did he really die on that alien world? A million thoughts rushed through his mind in an instant, even as his movements were sluggish, as if he were swimming in water, rather than immersed in air.

"Mom? Dad?" Kaarin's voice echoed eerily in the room.

There was a crash from downstairs. Driven by natural curiosity, the scout-boy ventured through the door. Time seemed to extend into eternity as he went. Finally, he was standing out the door, but a sudden chill ran down his spine. He turned around.

A pair of glowing eyes gazed at him from the darkness.

Kaarin started backing away – but the eyes followed. He bumped into the far wall, as a shadow emerged from the doorframe of his room, its shape vaguely reminiscent of a bulky humanoid, with hints of claws and teeth that could rend and tear. Kaarin tried to steel himself, but found nothing where his usual reserves of calm and courage resided – he spun to the staircase and ran down it, tripping, tumbling, into the waiting arms of another monster, waiting for him at the foot of the stairs.

The monster grabbed him by the neck, revealing another hand, holding a gleaming dagger.

Kaarin screamed and was stabbed.

ooo

"What have we got here?" asked the medical tech at the Sundae City Hospital. "The fuck is that?" he pointed at the contraption Yosef and Sai were bringing into the building on a lifting cart.

"Ms. Marte, explain," said Yosef, wiping the sweat off his brow.

"This is one capsule from a shipboard emergency cryoberth, plus a temporary power source to keep it functioning until we can get it to the hospital, which we did," she answered. Owing to the privilege of her sex, she was not required to provide most of the traction in the arrangement.

"Jak!" another man came to the scene. "Let them in, they have an appointment. The doctor is already waiting for you. Uh... although I thought that thing will be smaller. You'll have to go the long way around, because that thing won't fit into the staircase, or the elevator, not with that cart and the portable generator still attached."

"Lord, give me strength," sighed Yosef and proceeded with the haul.

ooo

Kaarin almost fell from the narrow wall he had climbed, by a hair recovering his balance and failing to fall onto the dark, unknown cavities below. He was cold. His fingers were cold. Where was he now? He remembered – this was the Tyrian downport, but not the one he visited just... how long ago was it? Which parts were real and which parts were dream? It was so hard to tell. Breathing carefully and slowly, he tried to calm himself, which came surprisingly easily – but also seemed less like the focused kind of calm he wanted, and instead the unfocused, lazy, sleepy kind of calm.

His fingers were icy. He shook his head, trying to focus. This was the downport, forty years ago. The day he decided to sneak into the facility, knowing a ship had landed there. There were a few every week, but this one came around only about once a year, doing a long round across the main, and into the great Imperium of the galactic east.

He opted to continue on his way, but the spectre of sluggishness has seized him. A century passed, then a millennium. Finally, he reached the end of the wall, where he could climb down on the stairs that led into the enclosed area.

The starship Captain was waiting by the ship. Kaarin walked over to him.

"Captain? Captain?" he called out.

The man muttered something, his face obscured from the angle that Kaarin observed him.

"What? I didn't catch that..."

Kaarin stepped closer, noting that he barely felt his legs. Looking down, he found them to be encased in ice, leaving traces of frost wherever he went. His hands too, their fingers frozen and blue, shedding snowflakes as he regarded them.

"A coin for the journey," the man repeated. Strangely, the voice was Yosef's.

"Yosef, is that you?"

Kaarin walked up no him. The stranger's head turned to face him, but it was not the old priest's face there, replaced by a skull draped over with emanciated skin.

"A coin for your journey to the underworld?"

Spooked, Kaarin backed away, but the monster with his comrade's voice was quicker.

He reached out with a skeletal hand and froze Kaarin's heart with a touch.

ooo

"Do whatever you need to do, doctor," Yosef had to sit down. The journey – the actual physical journey to the upstairs of the operation wing – had tired the old man out.

"I'm just pointing out that it is expensive, and you will have to pick up the bill even if surgery is not successful. The only thing keeping that man alive right now are the cryonics. There's no guarantee he'll live long enough to be operated on," the middle-aged doctor in the white and green coat.

"The Kingdom of Tyr is paying, through their authorized spokesman, Court Chaplain Yosef of Tyr, and that's me," said Yosef, testily. "We have more than you've stated as your upper-bound estimate. Right now I think you're just hedging us because you're uncertain about the outcome of the procedure. Worry not, we are both acquainted with losing friends to our enemies, and vagaries of fate. Now please do your work as best you can."

"I suppose you're right. Bring him in!" he commanded the orderlies, to the great relief of the aged priest. They rolled the cart with the contraption down the hallway, followed by the doctor himself.

"Ms. Marte, I'm not much of medic, and I realize you are not one either, but do you know anything about the sort of augments the doctor spoke about?"

"Some people have them, sir. Only rich people, though, because they're expensive."

"Yes, but what about side-effects. Are there any that the honoured physician didn't deem necessary to mention?"

"Yes, sir, I think so. They can be rejected, and need to be maintained. I don't know how often, sir."

"Well, I hope he can get used to them."

ooo

Kaarin drifted in space. A blue and green orb hovered in the far distance, on the stark blackness of space, a starless night with no suns and no moons. It took him ages before he mustered enough mental energy to shake off the daze that kept him spellbound.

His suit radio crackled: "Scout Kaarin, this is mission control. Do you read me?"

He tried to respond, but he found that his throat felt icy. In fact, his entire body had, despite the suit being build to prevent that. He seemed to be falling towards the green-and-blue orb – a planet, he realized.

"Mission control to Scout Kaarin. Can you hear me?"

Kaarin coughed up a lump of ice, with flecks of blood. He was accelerating, even as he suffered from the deathly chill, his suit began to burn up in the atmosphere upon re-entry.

"This is mission control to Scout Kaarin. Can you hear me?"

"This is Scout Kaarin... to mission control... I'm cold..." he croaked out. He was aflame. "Mission control... can't feel my arms. Can't... feel my legs."

"Mission control to Scout Kaarin! What is your status? What do you see?"

"The planet is blue... and there's nothing I can do..."

Darkness claimed him again.

ooo

"You can go in and see him now," the nurse said. "We're administering anaesthetic counteragents now."

"So our good Captain lives?"

"Well, we won't really be sure until he's woken up, which we hope will happen soon. Sometimes, the patients never come out of the medically induced coma," she explained.

"The body lives, but the soul has departed," said Yosef, rising from the couch. He and Sai had taken advantage of the hospital's waiting rooms for he last four hours, not having anything urgent to do while Arthur met with his secret contacts on the planet, and the meeting with the United Nations of Dostoevsky being scheduled in two days – or, at least, this is how Yosef rationalized it. Most of his decision to just lay down and catch an extended nap right there and then was the result of resting his eyes for a few moments. Sai, occupied with something on her portable computer, appeared not to mind the wait. "Let's see him."

ooo

The cold receded. He wasn't drowning, burning, stabbed, clawed, frozen, swimming in molasses or anything of the sort – which made for a stark difference, compared to the timeless period that he'd just suffered. Darkness still remained, however, but he instinctively knew the answer to curing that.

Kaarin opened his eyes, resulting in a shock from the amount of light. He closed them again and tried to raise his hand to his face, but found that impossible.

"Captain Sanders?" It was Yosef's voice!

He squinted, yielding a blurry sight of what was obviously a hospital room – a bed, an endtable, a couple of chairs, and plenty of medical apparatus. Medical apparatus hooked up to him. Beside the bed stood the priest-diplomat, his engineer, and a man dressed like an Imperial medical practitioner.

"I take it... you didn't come... for that coin?" he muttered.

"What? Is he lucid, doctor?"

"How should I know?" answered the stranger. "He might be. He might be hallucinating. He might be too brain damaged to ever recover."

"A barrel... of laughs... doctor." Kaarin wheezed. He found that he could move his neck, which helped him determine the reason why his arms were incapacitated – they were wrapped in cloth and hoisted up by strings. "How long... was I out?"

"Next to nine days," answered Yosef.

"My eye itches."

"That will pass with time. They always do while your body gets used to the new parts," said the physician.

"There is hardly a difference, really," the priest chimed in. "If I didn't know you had it replaced, I wouldn't have noticed."

"Where am I?"

Kaarin's consciousness was returning rapidly. He still felt a little wooly, but he could think, he could feel. Sitting up was probably out of the question. The bed was so constructed as to preclude substantial movements, and the middle was covered with some sort of gizmo which was tied to his torso.

"Sundae City Hospital, second planet, Dostoevsky system, sir," answered Sai Marte.

"Next question – what the hell happened?"

"To make a short story of it, you were gunned down during our flight from Caldos. You might say you owe your life to your late engineer, holy be his memory. We put you in the cryoberth and flew you over here. The fine folks here put you back together again," Yosef relayed. "You are beyond lucky, my friend. God clearly has you in His protection."

"Be sure to thank Him for me. I expected waking up after life-saving surgery to be a little more painful. I barely feel a thing."

"You're still under the effects of anaesthetics. I'm sure the pain will return in due time, when they wear off," the doctor injected.

"What exactly did you do to me? Besides cloning me a new eye, that is."

"We didn't actually clone you a new eye, Captain Sanders, we don't have the facilities for that here. It's an electronic prosthetic."

"Oh. Anything else?"

"One of your arms was broken, but that was an easy fix with some cell grown accelerators. Both of your shoulders were dislocated, but again, this was beyond simple."

"Quit hedging, doc," Kaarin said, and would have gestured, had he the ability to do so.

"Fine. We don't have nerve refusion technology here, likewise, our cloning capabilities are very limited with regards to direct medicinal applications. By the looks of your injuries prior to surgery, you were hit in the side of the torso, just under the lungs, with an anti-tank projectile. It exited on the other side, having shredded your diaphragm, most of the major organs in your bowel cavity, demolished five ribs and severed your spinal cord."

Kaarin swore.

"I'm not done yet."

Kaarin swore some more.

"Will you quit that? I was about to say that you will regain the ability to walk when we're through with you." Kaarin shut up for the moment, so the doctor continued. "The liver was salvageable, so we just patched it up – it'll recover to full capacity with time. I don't recommend going on any drinking binges for a few months at least. You have a set of prosthetic kidneys, and a hybrid digestive tract, reassembled in a bionic framework from the bits and pieces we've recovered. The new diaphragm is synthetic as well; the original might have been saved in better conditions, but the head surgeon decided against it, a decision I fully endorse. And, of course, prosthetic nerve bindings on your lower spinal cord. They're second generation – I'm told that they're better than the real thing, once you get used to the inevitable differences."

A sudden dread gripped Kaarin.

"What about... you know...?" he stammered.

The physician snorted. Yosef smirked. Sai looked instructable.

"You're in luck. That part of you was substantially undamaged. The prognosis is that you'll recover full use of your, ahem, lower extremities."

If Kaarin could wipe his brow in relief, he would have. In the meantime, a sigh of relief was good enough.

"So, what? Do I need batteries now? Need to be wound up every day?"

The doctor laughed. "No, no. Do you take anagathics, Captain?"

"No. Only nobles can afford that stuff. And it's habit-forming."

"In that case your prostheses have an expected usage life greater than your remaining lifespan. Regular check-ups are recommended, however. You're from Tyr, right? That's one of the better places to live, with regards to medical advancement. I'm sure they can do everything we can do here."

"When will you be finished with me? When can I leave?"

"That's a good attitude to have," said the medic. "We can get started on the rehabilitation immediately. If all goes well with the sims, you'll be walking in a day or two. Your attitude will help, I expect. It's not common enough to see someone accept major cybernetization without complaint... well, aside from a few curses. I could tell you stories of some the patients who never quite adapt to being partly synthetic, they just-"

"Rehabilitation. I want to get started on that," Kaarin cut in.

"Of course. I'll tell the nurse." The doctor left them.

"I'm glad you're alive," said Yosef.

"Me too, sir," said Sai.

"Yeah, yeah, me too. Thanks for getting me out of there. Can't say I remember very much after I met up with you in that lobby. They haven't messed with my brain, do you think?"

"As far as I can tell, they haven't. They have no reason to," opined Yosef. "The agent, Arthur, is going to be helping us on our assignment, although I'm not sure how long for and how far his help goes. I'm going to be speaking to the planetary leaders in a couple of days. Maybe you can be there, too, we'll see."

"That's your job, talking to the hobnobs. Me, I just ferry you around, shoot bad guys, and apparently get my guts obliterated."

Yosef smiled, and glanced outside. "That's the nurse coming with the VR helmet. Give us a call if you need anything before they discharge you."

"Yeah. I'll see you two later. Good luck with the meeting."

"Thanks. Get well soon."

ooo

Arthur's contact practically inhaled her third burger. There were few things which fazed him, but there were some he could never get used to, understand, or become jaded against. Such as codename Veronica's eating habits. He'd met her thrice before, and each of those times, she had their little information exchange meeting in a place she could order food – a bar, a diner, a restaurant. She was obviously overweight, but not so much that it impaired her mobility. Getting files on fellow agents was considered a huge no-no, so he had to wonder if Veronica was simply implanted with so many high power augments that her metabolism had to shift to permanent overdrive just to keep it all going, or if she simply swallowed a microscopic black hole that annihilated ninety percent of what she shoveled into her mouth.

"So you're saying that he's coming here?" she asked, between "bites".

"Yes, and we need your help to arrange a meeting with the commander of the picket. Maybe also the research administrator."

"Won't be easy, and I guarantee nothing. You'll have to convince them yourself, I can only get you within talking distance. You understand?" she bit the fourth hamburger in half.

"Naturally. Don't worry about the implementation details, we'll handle those."

"I'll give you a call when I'm done, then. Anything else, Art?"

"Oh, I wouldn't mind a salary increase, an extension on my license to kill, transfer to a capital world with hedonistic mores, and a luxurious new antigrav car," Arthur deadpanned.

Veronica blinked. She squinted.

Arthur smiled innocently. "What?"

"You're not half as funny as you think you are," she rolled her eyes, popping the other burger half in. "But you do need a transfer somewhere, when this is over. How about Caldos?"

"But that's where they already know my face!"

"Cosmetic surgery is not out of the question. Besides, not sending you to the Mycians again. Going to tell Mike to have you take over ops with the People's Dominion of Arden, or the Western Commonwealth."

Arthur grimaced. "The child-killers or the barbarians?"

"You'll see!"

"I guess I will. You're obviously busy, so I'll let you carry on with your duties," he told his senior in the service, if not quite his superior.

"Go directly to hell, Art."

Arthur smiled sweetly, clearly intending to communicate the feeling was mutual, and left without another word.


	9. Chapter 7

The Imperial Protectorate of Dostoevsky was not a unified world. On the twenty percent of the world's surface not covered with water, which consisted of approximately five thousand small landmasses of a hundred square kilometers or more. There was only one major continent, spanning the northern polar cap. This was the spot that the ninety-two sovereign states of the planet chose to house their United Nations Headquarters, since the landmass was only inhabitable with application of interstellar technology and nobody had settled it properly before the Third Imperium offered the world a protectorate status. While nominally there was a central government, the member states largely ran their own affairs. This confederation came close to war several times over petty squabbles, but the very existence of a putative hierarchy gave the Imperials a plausible target to do diplomacy with.

The headquarters was a marvel of relatively advanced antigravity technology, rising hundreds of meters above the permanent sheet of ice of the pole. Its highest level housed the Chamber of Representatives, where the ninety-two member states officially discussed matters of import, watched over from a viewer gallery above them.

"I yield ground to the honorable Father Yosef, Court Chaplain of the Tyrian Kingdom, here in his capacity as official envoy of his sovereign," said the Marshall of the Assembly, letting Yosef ascend to the podium. Hundreds of eyes focused on him.

"Honored representatives, respected administration members and assembled spectators," he intoned, his voice amplified in the room by an advanced internal sound system. "I come before you with a dire warning, and a request – but first and foremost, the first."

Like he has done repeatedly now, Yosef briefed the gathered heads of state on the current events involving the adventurer calling himself the Lord Admiral, and the danger he posed to the continued relative peace in the region, stressing his aggressive stance and potential ownership of working Ancient artifacts, making him a credible threat to not only one system, but everyone who happened to have the misfortune of living nearby. He didn't prolong his speech, in order to preclude the listeners getting bored and ceasing to pay attention, and was done in under ten minutes.

"So, the request that I would make on behalf of my liege lord is this: Help us, and in helping us, help yourselves. Aid us in repelling this invasion, before it gathers steam. Individually, we may be weak, but together, we can be strong! We can defeat this menace if we but close ranks and face him when he arrives, as I am certain he will soon – if he hadn't already."

A man in one of the middle rows pressed his speaking button. "Mister Yosef," he said, without bothering with formalities. "I have heard your story – because it is a story at this point – and I asked myself, why should I believe you? We have no quarrel with Tyr, but we also don't have any dogs in this fight, so to speak. If there even is a fight, even! Do you have proof that what you say is true?"

"Yes, indeed, I do," replied Yosef. "I am sending everyone here our after-action findings following the Battle of Tyr. As you can see if you but check, we have communication logs saying without doubt that this warlord is preparing an invasion of the Sindalian main. And if he is planning that, Dostoevsky may be next."

"'If' being the operative word here. Computer data can be faked, and easily."

"Let's not forget that we aren't part of the main. We are also an Imperial Protectorate," noted a woman in the front row. "He wouldn't dare to attack us."

"If he exists," pressed the man.

"The danger's real!" exclaimed another man, from the other side of the chamber. "The Imperium cannot protect us, we are just too far away. We need to strengthen our forces, and seek local alliances, just like the man is saying!"

"Stop injecting your anti-Imperial secessionism into everything," a fellow from the back objected, rising from his seat.

"It's relevant here!" the anti-Imperial representative said. "This picket we have is barely capable of keeping out pirates, let alone turn back an invasion. Our few system defense ships are not enough."

"He has a point," said the front-row woman. "But even if the Imperium cannot protect us immediately, attacking us would mean a serious breach of sphere of influence."

"If this threat exists," repeated the denialist. "We have far too little trustworthy information, and we won't believe you at your word," he said to Yosef.

"Speak for yourself," harrumphed the secessionist. "I believe him, and we need to act now."

"We don't need to do anything hasty, unlike this repetitive idiot!" countered the back-row man.

"What did you call me?!"

"I called you an idiot, because that's what you are, an idiotic, bottom-feeding, alarmist, bull-headed, urchibod idiot!"

"We don't use that word!" shrieked the woman. "The urchibods deserve better than this, you colossal dick!"

Yosef watched this exchange with incredulity and increasing alarm. The Marshall of the Assembly pushed past him.

"Order! Order! Order!" he shouted into the microphone.

For his troubles, he was rewarded with a fruit – and not a soft one, either – launched at him. It made a sharp bonk sound as it impacted his head, knocking the politician out. Yosef was already hurriedly leaving the stage, in the direction of the back exit, as a gigantic free-for-all was beginning in the assembly chamber. Three loose coalitions formed with uncanny speed – the secessionists, the Imperials, and a third group that obviously disliked both equally. Bodyguards of various politicians and heads of state leapt from the balcony overhead, some supported by antigravity devices, some simply diving and hoping for the best, as the Headquarters' own guard rushed in through the entrances to form a fourth party to the conflict.

Yosef did not stay to watch, only prayed for their souls, and that nobody die in the melee.

ooo

"I should have warned you, perhaps," said Arthur. "The local politicians and nobility aren't exactly on too friendly terms with each other."

"I knew that beforehand," said Yosef. "I can use the shipboard library as well as you can. What wasn't in the official description is that they apparently like to hold brawls every other meeting. That could have helped somewhat to know, but I'm not sure if it would. There is no actual central authority to appeal to here. I can only that the next assembly will feel less inclined to set at each others' throats, and more inclined to listen to reason."

"I wouldn't bet on it."

"Then what do you propose we do? Give up and go somewhere else?"

"Not yet. I've managed to book a meeting at the research base."

"You mean with the Imperials."

"Yup. We're going for a meeting with the head researcher and the commander of the local Imperial picket. I am fairly certain these two will not get into a fistfight over perceived wrongs."

Before Yosef could reply, the airlock chimed the conclusion of its cycle.

Arthur already had a gun in his had, which was momentarily surprising to Yosef. Then he realized that they didn't hear anyone ring the intercom, requesting entry.

"Anyone home?" came Kaarin's voice. "Hello!"

Arthur stowed his firearm, just before the Captain appeared at the far end of the corridor, steadfastly plodding along, supported by a medical cane on each arm. His legs barely moved at all, and he was visibly stressed by the ordeal, but nonetheless seemed content to walk on his own.

"Kaarin! Welcome back! Are you sure you are supposed to be walking around so soon?" Yosef asked, going over to him, in order to help him on the way to the common room.

"It will be a cold day in hell when I stay in a hospital an hour longer than I need to," said Kaarin, plopping down on the couch.

"You look adequately well," commented Arthur.

"I feel like I'm made of poorly-fit prefabricated components," complained Kaarin. "But I'll live. The important parts are the same, and I'm getting the hang of walking under my own power. It's a bitch, but I can get from place to place."

"Good thing you don't need to walk around much when captaining the ship," said Yosef.

"Yeah, but I'll have to practice anyway. I intend to be fully functional as soon as possible, if not considerably sooner. What's up? What's the mission status? What's the plan?"

Yosef grimaced. "Appealing to the United Nations of Dosotoevsky was a bust, and will likely remain a bust for the forseeable future." He told the Captain about the brawl in the assembly chamber.

Kaarin whistled. "I wish I could have been there. It's not every day you get to see a bunch of political lowlifes sic each other."

"That's very uncharitable of you, Captain, but not altogether untrue. I believe you can get a holo recording of the event from multiple angles on the planetary network."

"Remind me to download that before we leave the system, so I have something extra to entertain me in-jump. What's next on the agenda?"

"Meeting with the Imperial representatives here, the commander of the picket, and the head researcher at the underwater research base."

"When?"

"First thing in the morning."

"I'll make sure the ship is ready for underwater action, then. I called Ms. Engineer ahead and had her collect my low-berth from the hospital. She should be here in an hour or two. In the meantime, I get to sit here and direct an inspection of the 'Imminent Misjump', with you two acting as my hands and feet," Kaarin stated the immediate plan, getting hold of his datapad and connecting to the ship's internal radio communications network. "We'll start with the hull integrity diagnostics..."

ooo

"'Imminent Misjump', you are cleared for take-off and approach of Research Base Delta," said the traffic control dispatcher. "You are also freely advised that it is possible re-register your ship's name at the Imperial Embassy."

"I'll keep that under advisement, traffic control. 'Imminent Misjump' out," said Kaarin, hanging up. "What does everyone have against the name? Jeez."

"Maybe they think it lacks a certain gravitas," opined Yosef.

"Maybe they think it's tempting fate," opined Arthur.

"It's both, I already explained."

The ship gracefully lifted off the launch pad at the Imperial starport, without disturbing its passengers in any fashion, thanks to the gravitic compensation system. They were going roughly directly up.

"The research base is on the opposite side of the planet, according to this map we got," Kaarin told them. "So we're not going to fly around in the atmosphere like dweebs. I'll take a shortcut through low orbit, where I can pull a decent speed without roasting us alive."

"We'll miss seeing the local agriculture," said Yosef. "It's a pity, because the seafarms I've read about are quite interesting, especially from the perspective of a dry worlder like myself."

"They're not that interesting," said Arthur. "Just a bunch of green splotches, floating fences and water-sifting ships."

"You've been here before then."

"Yes."

"I suppose it's classified as part of your job, then?"

"Yes."

"Is that all you're going to say?"

"Yes."

Yosef laughed.

"Are you two done?" said Kaarin, rolling his eyes. "Don't make we wave my cane at you two. How's the situation in there, Engineering?" he used the intercom.

"All systems functioning within tolerances, sir," said Sai Marte from the other end.

"Does that mean we're good, or does that mean that we'll survive for the time being, but I shouldn't be betting on anything past another hour?"

"Sir, the ship is functioning properly. All repairs have been carried out in full accordance with the specifications and applicable standards. There is no reason to fear the ship falling apart, sir."

"That's what I wanted to hear. Keep up the good work, there, PO."

"Yes, sir!"

They've exited the planet's overly carbonated atmosphere, and swung around opposite to its spin, plunging back into the airy cloak above the indicated location of the research base. Starships being airtight by design and capable of surviving exposure to a gas giant's tumultuous upper layers, a spell of diving beneath the waves was no great feat. The crew felt that one, as the compensation only softened the blow of the scoutship piercing the surface, rather than completely obliterating the shock.

"We're under," announced Kaarin.

"Sensors set to auditory and visual," said Arthur from the computer room. "I'm picking up the research base's beacon. Mapping onto your plot, Captain."

Kaarin oriented the ship towards the new waypoint and stepped on it. The 'Imminent Misjump's' streamlined wedge shape enabled them to cut through water almost as easily as through air, leaving behind a huge wake of bubbles. Five kilometers straight down sped past in seconds. Kaarin slowed down when they got within a single kilometer of the indicated location.

"We've got visual," indicated Arthur.

Research Base Delta was quite a sight – although few ever saw it properly, given the almost complete lack of solar illumination at the depth – being a sort of small city of skyscrapers and transparent domes sitting on the edge of a gigantic undersea crevice. The human eye could not properly see it whole, despite the artificial lights dotting the structures. Various small submersible craft zoomed about the place. Kaarin guided his ship towards a docking ring, much like those on highports in space.

"IISS 'Imminent Misjump', this is Research Station Delta," crackled the radio. "You're arrival is noted. We have been forewarned. Please proceed to docking berth C."

"Acknowledged, Research Station Delta. Coming in to dock at berth C."

ooo

"What do they research here, again, Arthur?" Kaarin asked as they waited for the airlock to cycle.

"You saw that fissure on the side? There's a wreck of an Ancient starship down there."

"Can't be in good condition, with it being under so much damn water."

"It's not, as far as I know," Arthur shrugged. "Between the water pressure, the passage of three hundred millennia, and the fact that it appears to have crash landed on this world, it's actually in remarkably good shape."

"Me, I'm impressed with you being so forthright about supposed Imperial secrets," Yosef remarked.

Arthur smiled. "I am given broad discretion concerning disclosure of less important classified details."

The airclock completed its cycle, letting the three of them into the research base's interior – Sai was volunteered to stay behind on the ship in case something unforeseen happened, such as a sudden loss of welcome on the undersea station. They were greeted by an Imperial security detail. After being positively identified as who they were supposed to be, they were escorted deeper into the bowels of the facility, their speed adjusted so that Kaarin could keep pace, hobbling along. For all its prestigious character as a place of learning of the most advanced civilization ever to grace the known region of space, the interior looked very nondescript, like an arbitrary starship interior.

The guards led them past numerous closed doors and a few intersections, concluding their short trek at a conference room.

"The Commodore and Dr. Hart will be here presently," said the leader of the escort. "Make yourselves at home."

"Far too much water to be home," said Kaarin, but sat down all the same and poured himself a cup of stim from a provided container. Arthur and Yosef followed suit.

The other party took several minutes to arrive.

First came in the Imperial navy officer, a gaunt man of uncertain age and emotionless outward appearance. Following him was an almost stereotypical researcher – grey haired, advanced in the process of balding top-down, labcoat-wearing, and sporting several visible augments on his head, including an artificial eye, an ear replacement and a wafer jack.

Arthur and Kaarin stood up and saluted – while they were all in different branches in service of the Emperor, it was polite to do so.

"At ease," said the military man reflexively, without emotion. "Commodore Alan Hayes."

"Doctor Hamed Hart, Esquire," introduced himself the researcher.

"Arthur, Imperial Intelligence," the agent introduced himself.

"Whereas I am Father Yosef, Court Chaplain of Tyr, here in my capacity as official envoy of the the King. My companion with the canes is Captain Kaarin Sanders, of the Imperial Interstellar Scout Service."

"We're aware who you are," said the Commodore, seating himself opposite the trio, with the scientist taking place by his side. "I also have my suspicions why you are here, but tell us anyway."

"It feels as though I've told the same story far too many times, with far too little effect," confessed Yosef. "Nonetheless..."

The priest proceeded to lay out the short version of the imminent threat to the Sindalian main, and the entire Trojan Reach. While the officer remained unimpressed, the researcher looked troubled.

"Any hypothetical conquest of Dostoevsky would play merry hell with our work here. We can't allow that to happen, obviously," said Dr. Hart.

"Any enemy attempting to conquer the system first needs to get through my task force, and the local defense forces of the protectorate," said the Commodore calmly. "I've followed the debate in the assembly. I have also reviewed available data. I believe that the threat exists."

"Finally, some headway on this problem!" Kaarin balled his fists.

"However, I am disinclined to remove the forces stationed here in order to reinforce other systems."

"Damn it!" the scout slammed his fists into the table. "He's going to pick us off, defeat in detail style, while we're divided."

"I understand that risk, Captain," said the navyman. "But my first priority is protecting Dostoevsky, and Dostoevsky's research station. Protection of unaffiliated states the region, while certainly a concern per my mandate, are strictly secondary to keeping this facility safe."

"Commodore," said Dr. Hart, "I am not reassured that you can, with just the forces at your disposal, meet this threat when it chooses to come to you."

"I wasn't aware you studied naval tactics, doctor." The tone in which he said it differed not at all from everything else he had said. Kaarin thought the ability to remain perfectly calm was uncanny. One could not easily tell what was it that the officer intended to convey, outside of the nominal face value of the statement.

"Oh, years and years ago," the researcher waved a hand. "I was drafted as a strapping young man, and served a term as an engineer on a capital ship. I picked up a thing or two."

"Nonetheless, I am quite certain that the Black Swan and my frigates can take a mere two-thousand ton converted freighter."

"Even if it uses Ancient technology?" Yosef leaned in, raising an eyebrow. "We don't know exactly how much of working artifacts he has, but he does have some."

"Nec Hercules contra plures," said the Commodore.

Arthur and Kaarin raised eyebrows, mildly confused by the unfamiliar phrase. Yosef explained: "It's a Terran expression. It means something to the effect of 'even the mightiest strongman is laid low by numbers'. It has a literal meaning, but I don't think you'd be familiar with Terran prehistorical paganism."

"I'm impressed!" said the researcher. "Very few people know these things these days. I myself taught that one to the Commodore. Commodore, I would invite you to consider the following scenario – suppose you have a proper capital ship at your disposal, and the opposing force consists of scoutships, mining boats and small armed traders. How many do you think you can take before their numbers become overwhelming?"

The Commodore's eyes narrowed. "Arbitrary amounts. They would likely be unable to deal my ship enough damage quickly enough that the damage control crews couldn't handle it, unless they were supremely well coordinated, which is unlikely given the difficulty rises with every vessel involved in maneuvering. I might still lose, if they are lucky, but they need luck to even survive. I just need to be not entirely unlucky."

"Yes, I thought so. Suppose that the difference in class between your flagship and the Lord Admiral's is as that between converted freighters and a capital ship?"

"Impossible."

"My team has a rule of thumb concerning the Ancients – nothing is impossible for them."

"If that man truly has a ship that could take a capital ship, then our help is pointless, short of calling reinforcements from Tobia," concluded the Commodore. "Nothing you have said so far has given me good reasons to leave my post here, and go off help you against an enemy that might not even be interested in picking a fight with the Imperium, whose plans we know only in the barest of outlines, and whose capabilities – while historically considerable – remain opaque. I would rather send for help to the Duke of Tobia, and go on a peacekeeping intervention, than removing my forces from this system."

Kaarin resisted the urge to facepalm.

"Is there truly nothing we can get here, in terms of help in our struggle?" Yosef asked pleadingly.

"I didn't say that and the Commodore especially did not say that," said Dr. Hart. "Even if the Commodore is unwilling to commit his force, there are perhaps ways in which I, in my capacity as head researcher of this base, can aid you. For one, I can offer the good Captain help with his injuries, whatever they are, since I very much doubt the backwards butchers on the surface could do a good job of anything."

"They're not so bad," said Kaarin. "Look, I can wiggle my legs a bit, and can walk slowly if supported. Compared to a wheelchair, this is heaven on earth. I can pilot a starship without issue."

"Be that as it may, if they released you before making sure your cloned tissues were integrated, they did a poor job."

"They don't have cloning. At least not where I received care," said Kaarin. "It's all prosthetics."

Dr. Hart blinked, then sighed. "Barbarians. Truly barbarians. We don't quite have facilities to take you apart and put you back together again – this isn't a medical research lab – but I can have the base physician take a look at your prosthetics and maybe find some way to accelerate rehabilitation."

"Well, I would be thankful, doctor!" Kaarin said.

"Glad to help, this probably won't take more than a day. While you're here, all of you, feel free to talk to anyone below level three clearance. If there's anything you can think of concerning how I can help you protect our continued research without disturbance by wars, do let me know."

"Thank you, doctor. We do appreciate this gesture, and will submit any requests we have," Yosef said.

"Are we done here?" the Commodore asked, matter-of-factly.

"I believe so. I'll have the security captain show you around and give you access to guest quarters for the night," said the researcher, standing up. "Ahead of time, I wish you the best of luck in your endeavours. Now if you'll excuse me, I have the sum total of human knowledge to expand."

ooo

"This isn't quite the standard I had gotten used to on Caldos," remarked Kaarin, stretching out on a cot in the salon of the three-bedroom apartment they received as their guest quarters. Space was obviously at a premium on the station, which made the lodgings quite extravagant enough. "I mean, we'll practically have to share rooms when Sai gets here from the ship!"

"Don't be ungrateful, Captain. There are quite enough beds and chambers here that nobody will be forced to share a location with anyone they particularly dislike having to sleep next to. Instead, enjoy that you aren't being accused of trying to murder the local ruler," admonished Yosef.

"Yet."

"I have excellent hopes that our stay here will not end in disaster, and my prayers are to that effect."

"Yeah, yeah, I'm not trying to find problems that aren't there."

"Speaking of problems, I think we should focus on the one we already have. Namely, getting aid. The Commodore refuses to send ships, but may be inclined to send word to the nearest Imperial navy base, so that they send us a cruiser or three. The good doctor Hart is not in a position to help us much, but has offered us anything we can talk out of the junior researchers. That's something, at least."

"Not that I'm not grateful and all," said Kaarin, concentrating meanwhile on slowly raising one of his legs with very limited success, "but that's probably not much of help. It does help me to become a functional person again, I suppose, but it didn't impair me much from doing my job as a glorified chauffeur for you."

Sai Marte chose this moment to arrive at their quarters, carrying a duffel bag of personal effects.

"Sir, the ship is securely locked down," she said.

"Good. Pick a room, any room," Kaarin waved at the entrances to the bedrooms.

"As the only woman among us, you get to have the luxury of a private bedroom," said Yosef. "We men can find ourselves with what is left."

"Yes, sir." She went off to the nearest room, briefly inspected it to her liking, dumped the bag there and returned to the salon with a datapad in hand.

"So. Plans. You got any ideas, Engi?" Kaarin looked at his anorexic subordinate.

"Um. Concerning our plans on what to do after we leave here, sir?"

"Yeah. Got any input you'd like to share?"

Sai Marte seemed to brace herself, as though she were to give a speech to a crowd of millions. "Yes. Sir." She put the datapad on the table and produced a holographic projection – one of the early ones, obviously not real – of the nearby stars. "Dostoevsky is separated from every nearby system by a two-parsec gap. Two-nine-one-dash-five-four-zero is uninhabited. Janus and Torrance are very sparsely populated and don't have spacefaring capability of their own. One is Caldos. Lacidaeus is the last world, which consists of a single inhabited planetoid. Population is estimated at fifty million. They have spacefaring capability, but do not field any navy, and prefer to defend their with ground-based installations."

"That's only the immediate systems, though," said Kaarin. "I wish this weren't so urgent. I'd have gone to the Florians or the Imperium myself. But by then it'd all be too late."

"Probably," shrugged Yosef. "We should decide between one of the two – Lacidaeus, or Caldos."

"And why exactly would we go to Caldos again?"

"Because there are two more polities there that might be more favourably inclined towards us. So far as I know, they have generally similar capabilities as the Mycians, and each has their own chunk of the star system claimed."

"Getting in stealthily will be a bitch. No stealth in space, right, Engi?"

"Yes, sir. We cannot make the approach to the world without being detected in most circumstances," Sai said.

"'Most circumstances'... pardon me for not being well-versed in the technical side of ship operations, but care to explain why we can't just sneak in?" Yosef inquired.

"Yes, sir. Ships generate a lot of heat, and that heat stands out strongly against the near-absolute-zero of background space. Much of the ship's life support system handles radiating that heat to space, where it cannot cook the crew."

"Can't you just radiate it in one direction?"

"Only works up to the moment when someone looks at us from an angle that isn't directly ahead of us," Kaarin noted. He sat up with some difficulty. "We do system scans while en-route to and from a planet, or when refueling in the wild. It's not hard to pick up sensor buoys. There were plenty of those in the Caldos system. Not all of them were Mycian, probably, but I'll bet something like one-third probably were. Plus, there's the jump exit."

"What about the jump exit?"

"Sai?"

"Yes, sir. The jump exit is a highly energetic phenomenon. When the ship emerges from jumpspace, some of radiation naturally occurring in that dimension leaks out into realspace. This can be easily detected, even more easily so than a starship."

"Couldn't we then, I don't know, leave jumpspace somewhere hidden? Like behind a gas giant?"

"The Caldos system has four gas giants, one in the inner system and three in the outer system, sir," helpfully noted Sai.

Kaarin frowned in thought. "Well... I guess that would work. There weren't any anomalous pings that far out, if I recall. Yeah, this could work! Jump into the outer system, with a plot to come out in the shadow of the farthest gas giant in there. Take a detour to refuel at that one, damning anyone who disagrees about wild refuelling. Use it as a slingshot into the inner system." He paused. "That still leaves the problem of getting the ship to the surface without being spotted and torn to shreds. I read the logs and I don't want to repeat what happened when you left the system. The Mycians are too well armed for us."

"Can we disguise the ship?" Yosef asked, continuing the brainstorm.

"Could have it repainted at the starport. But if they get a good sensor look at us, they'll probably realize who we are. Engi," Kaarin turned to Sai. "Take a tour of the facility. Talk to every researcher you can find about stuff that could help us get in and out of the Caldos system, anything they have. Cloaking fields, teleporters, anything. You have time until they've fixed me up tomorrow."

"Yes, sir!" Sai gathered up her datapad, and left the apartment.

"Yosef, those were good ideas. I appreciate the input."

"Any special assignments for me?"

"Figure out where Arthur has gone off to."

"You certainly saved the worst assignments for the old man," sighed the priest. "I'll see what I can do. When did you see him last? I recall him being with us when we were shown to our quarters here."

"He excused himself and went off somewhere after that. I don't know where. His comm isn't answering. I mean, he's not technically part of the crew, just some random Imperial agent who we've taken in for a ride on the 'Misjump', but I'd like to know what the hell he's doing. I'm damn sure he didn't just excuse himself to take a piss, because there's a bathroom right here."

"You don't trust him?"

"Not farther than I can toss him, and, well, I can't toss things were well in my condition now."

"I think you're being overly paranoid, Captain. If I am any judge of character, I'd say he's a decent man under all that cloak-and-dagger facade."

"It won't hurt to check. If he's really an Imperial agent, then he'll appreciate us doing our due diligence with regards to verifying that he isn't some kind of mole, traitor or scammer just taking us for a ride."

Yosef sighed. "I will do as you ask. I'll find out where he is."

ooo

Blissfully unaware of his comrades distrust – albeit maintaining a healthy level of suspicion towards them as he did of anyone – Arthur met with a young technician in the bowels of the engineering section of the research base on Dostoevsky. He couldn't quite leave the place, without arousing suspicion and without taking altogether too much time to get anywhere. The 'Imminent Misjump' was the fastest thing docked at it, besides the Commodore's shuttle, and he unfortunately did not get free access to either.

"Did you bring it?" he asked him.

"Uh, bring what? Who are you?" the acne-pocked man asked, visibly sweating in the air-conditioned atmosphere.

"Don't play dumb. You came here to repay a favour owed, and I'm the one who you are going to repay it to."

"She didn't say anything about someone else collecting this."

"You've already let slip that you know why I'm here," Arthur pressed. "No covert operative material, you. Now, do you have the wafer? The data?"

The technician deflated. "Yes. I do. It's all here. The full personal dataset, via the shuttle's commlink to the destroyer. I just hope that you two are who you say you are, or this is high treason, and I'm going to be executed." He whipped out a standard data wafer.

Arthur took the wafer. "Only if anyone ever figures out that it was you who did the crack. Were you careless?"

"No! I'm the best. There's no trace of it, and it's plausible that the Commodore would want to access his files remotely. There's no way to connect it to me. I covered my tracks!"

"Then I believe you have nothing to fear," the agent smiled. "This settles your debt to us. However, we might still be in need of a good computer specialist – in exchange for appropriate recompense, this time. You could buy a great many things for a thick wad of Imperial Credits, you know."

"Geez, stop that. Don't contact me again. I gotta get back to my post, before someone notices I'm gone."

"You do that. Thanks for your cooperation."

Like a shadow, Arthur melted back into the shadows and mazes of tubes.

ooo

Yosef ordered a second glass of wine, which was remarkably palatable coming from the cantine of a research installation placed on the ocean floor, far away from anything else on the planet.

"By the way," he asked the bartender, a middle-aged woman, "have you seen a friend of mine. He's about average height, brown eyes, short-black hair. Sort of nondescript. Last I've seen him, he was wearing a dark blue spacer suit."

"Like that guy?" she pointed.

Yosef turned around on the stool, coming face-to-face with Arthur.

"'Speak of the Devil, and he is at your elbow'," said the agent. "Looking for me, Yosef?"

"As a matter of fact, yes. The Captain was looking for you. Said you'd disappeared after we've been shown to our lodgings. Are there any activities you would like me to know about? What have you been up to these past few hours?"

"Who, me?" Arthur exaggerated innocent surprise. "I was merely doing... certain things... at another location. Nothing important, just crossing t's and dotting i's, you know."

"I actually don't know, but you aren't going to tell me much more, are you now?"

Arthur smiled even more sweetly.

"Well, I guess my task is done, you having essentially found yourself. We've deliberated and decided to go back to Caldos at soonest opportunity and try to sneak into one of the rival factions of the world, to gain their support," Yosef conveyed. "Any comments you wish to have on that?"

"Oh, that seems like an adequate plan. Risky, but it might succeed," Arthur shrugged. "When are you – we – leaving?"

"As soon as the assorted medical personnel have had a look at Kaarin. He's sent Ms. Marte on a quest to find some technological gadget that might help us effectuate the infiltration."

"Did she succeed?"

"We don't know yet. I'm afraid we don't have the same efficiency at doing our things, as you have for doing your things."

"Obviously."

"Beer? Wine? Spirits? I'm sure you have some mysterious way of avoiding inebriation."

"Yes. I never drink."

"That must make infiltration a lot harder, then, if you can't get your targets drunk."

"I never said they don't drink," grinned Arthur.

Yosef shook his head. "This is going to be a fun couple of days."

ooo

"What's this then?" Kaarin pointed at the large crate in the common room. In the past thirty-six hours, he'd been dragged all across the station, had all his measurements taken in triplicate – it seemed like – and had wires applied to his body liberally. For what it was worth, all this annoyance actually seemed to have an effect. He was able to walk unaided now, the medical staff having calibrated the software that ran his life-and-function-sustaining implants. He couldn't run yet, but he felt certain he'd get there eventually, and it wasn't that important to him anyway.

"It's non-reflective coating for the ship, sir!" replied Sai. "Dr. Hart has given us enough to pain the ship twice over."

Kaarin did a quick mental calculation. "What? That's like fifteen megacreds worth!"

"Yes, sir."

"I guess it's cheaper than supplies for the picket force in active operations," he rubbed the side of his face. The new eye felt different, but he had gotten used to ignoring that. "Good. When can we get that applied?"

"As soon as we land somewhere dry, sir. It cannot be applied wet."

"The starport then," he nodded to himself. "Good. I'll gather the other two. Get the ship ready for departure as soon as possible."

"Yes, sir!"


	10. Chapter 8

The Captain of the free trader 'Amortized Expense' was having a fairly good day – even month – so far. Just a few weeks ago, he'd chance-met another trader at Planet Acid, as the system was called in the trader slang of the region, and made a very, very good deal. Two megacredits worth of highly illegal augments became his property back then, and he sought to distribute them at some world nearby that had a large population just yearning to have all their troubles melt away in a self-administered haze of bliss. The implants were self-burrowing, so there wasn't even any problem if the purchasers had no medical augmentation facilities on hand. Just slap it against the side of your head, bear with the brief pain, and thereafter enjoy a lifetime of happiness. They, he and his first mate, even tested one of these things on the ship's officially designated contraband tester – and boy, did his morale improve since! He highly expected making something to the order of ten megacreds in profit on these. Maybe eleven. Right now, he was taking it slow, chasing down a gas giant in the Caldos system on his way thought, to refuel and evaluate the likelihood of good business to be done here, based on transmissions analysis of their recent news.

His daydreaming came to an end when the proximity and radiation hazard alarms blared simultaneously, throwing him from his seat. Scrambling back up, he grabbed the helm to veer away from danger to his port side. The bridge crew rushed to fill their positions.

"Jump exit in direct proximity!" announced his first officer. "We're clear!"

"Get me on the comm to that bloody pirate!"

ooo

"Who the hell was that guy?" asked Kaarin, after the profanity-laden message had ended. The free trader – with their transponder off, of course – veered away from their location, but keeping a course for the gigantic super-Jovian ahead.

"I don't know, but they sounded very angry," quipped Arthur.

"Unless I miss my guess," said Yosef, "we don't have any control over where exactly we emerge in a star system, or any way to detect someone being in the way, thus their anger seems misplaced. Am I wrong?"

"Nope," Kaarin said.

"Well then I will pray that his soul finds peace from the perils of wrath."

"You do that. We're in. Pity about being detected so early, but I guess we don't actually have control over everything. Arthur, get me a course to skim the giant's atmosphere, then to swing around to the main world in the inner system. We'll play it stealthy for now, transponder off, just like that cretin. If discovered, we claim to have forgotten to turn it on. Get it?"

"Got it."

"Of course, Captain."

"Then let's roll."

ooo

Lieutenant Griddle hated his job. He wanted to be a pilot, but he got stuck manning this imported sensor station in high orbit. He spent two weeks up top, then three weeks on the ground. It was highly paid, sure, but it was also boring as all hell. Most of it was staring at superfreighters come in loaded with foodstuffs and leave with various industrial goods the planet produced. Half of them never even went through Mycian-controlled space. That would change, he expected, but the eventual victory of the Mycian Empire could be long in coming – the Childkillers and the Barbarians were considerable foes, for all their lack of proper civilization.

Today, the skies were relatively clear. No big ships coming or going, just a handful of smallfry, like that free trader, 'Amortized Expense' according to its transponder. He lazily turned the baleful gaze of his active sensors in their direction, expecting to find absolutely nothing out of the ordinary, and maybe then die of boredom. Getting roughly what he expected, he was just about to stop a detailed investigation and resume regular sweeps of the sky, when he found that he'd almost missed something that wasn't quite routine: radio chatter reflections. He investigated – activating sensor buoys on the same ecliptic plane as the incoming ship.

Luckily, the transmission wasn't encoded, though it was degraded, the buoy not being exactly the intended recipient:

"...T FOLLOWING US YOU ASS-MUNCHING, FLA... … ASSHOLE OF THE... IN... ….LIVESTOCK... ...FUCK YOU!"

Now this was interesting.

Griddle switched between buoys until he found the vector where the messages were traveling on, then easily found the opposite one, catching some replies too:

"...eep telling you, idiot, we're not following you! Hey, hey, you talk to him!" a man's voice said.

Another man spoke after a brief pause. "What my colleague is trying to say that we're merely going in the same direction, and far be it for us to mean you any harm. It's all a coincidence that we both chose to have the same ideas about refueling and sheer poor luck that we nearly came in on top of you. We just want to get to Caldos, that is all."

What was so damn strange about it was that he was seeing only one ship. Yet, there were obviously two sides to this conversation. A contradiction – but Lieutenant Griddle knew the answer to this puzzle. He grinned ear-to-ear, happy to have some entertainment at long last.

"Smugglers," he said to himself, and activated the high priority comm.

ooo

"Thanks, Yosef. I really owe you one," said Kaarin. "That complete moron nearly blew our cover. Can you believe it?"

"Never underestimate the stupidity of others, chief," said Arthur.

"Is that one of your secret service mottos?"

"No comment."

Kaarin rolled his eyes. "Of course not."

He was just about to relax properly, when Arthur spoke up.

"We're getting hailed," he said.

"If it's that damn trader again, I swear to Yosef's God-"

"Don't do—"

"-that I'm going to drop this charade and open fire on that son of a whore!"

"It's not them. It's from groundside."

"Crap."

"Not unexpected."

"No. Yosef, take the comm."

"If you insist, Captain, but do understand and recall what I said. I will not lie on your behalf, nor anyone else's."

"You're still the best speaker we have."

"In terms of deception, I am sure that Arthur has no equal on board."

"Transmission on speakers, gents," Arthur said, and pressed a button.

"Attention unidentified vessel, bearing..." the speaker paused, then read a bunch of numbers. "This is the Mycian Imperial Space Customs Service. Identify yourself!"

"Em-aye-ess-see-ess, my apologies. Turning on the transponder now," said the priest.

"Free Trader 'Luxantus', your transponder is now on," said the man on the other side of the transmission. "State your business in the Mycian Empire."

"We have no business in the Mycian Empire. We're headed for the Western Commonwealth."

"Free Trader 'Luxantus', you are in Mycian space. You will submit to a customs inspection. Power down your engines."

"We have no business with the Mycians. We're not headed for the Mycian Empire."

"You are in Mycian space. The inspection is not optional. Power down your engines, or we will use force to achieve compliance."

Yosef pressed the mute button.

"What do we do now?"

"They've not buying your story," opined Arthur. "They have a system defense boat heading towards us."

"Buy us time!" Kaarin instructed. "Tell them we need to slow down or we'll be a space hazard, headed directly for the planet."

"Em-aye-ess-see-ess, we need to slow down more before we can power down our engines."

There was a pause on the other end.

"Our calculations show your present course not to be dangerous to the planet, or other traffic. Power down your engines, now."

Yosef muted the exchange again.

Kaarin dragged a palm across his face. "The dumb, stubborn bastards. Okay, accept the damn inspection. Arthur, how much before intercept?"

"Twenty minutes at current vectors."

"Engi, power down the engines," he transmitted to the aft of the ship. "Put us in a drift. Don't power down anything else."

"Yes, sir!"

"Arthur, do you have disguise kits anywhere?"

"I might have."

"Good. You have twenty minutes to make us look as little as ourselves as you possibly can. Go!"

ooo

The Mycian SDB, number three of nine, lazily matched velocities with the supposed Free Trader 'Luxantus'. Being just barely not a smallcraft, it proceeded towards direct docking, rather than launch the smallcraft it didn't have. Private Timeo waited in anxious anticipation. This was his first real deployment, and he hoped against his better judgment that this vessel turned out to be some kind of smuggler or better yet, a pirate. That would lead to action, adventure – maybe a promotion! – and plenty of hot chicks interested in a mighty spaceman bloodied in pitched battle in outer space, when he came back for shore leave.

"Alright, boys, we're beginning docking procedures, line up in an orderly fashion," said the Sergeant.

They did as they were instructed and trained, the four of them, including the Sarge. The airlock before them began to cycle. Timeo gripped his slug rifle tighter. It took ages, from his perspective, and when it finally opened, it revealed a somewhat plump woman – though you'd never guess it just from her hard-etched face – in a vacc suit with the helmet off.

"Imperial Mycian customs inspection," said the Sarge, waving a well-used plastpaper warrant in the woman's face.

"Um. Yes. Please come in. Sirs," stammered she, trying to read the sheet before it was snatched away. The Sergeant plowed past her, clearly having identified her as no threat. Timeo didn't see any weapons on her, either, though looks could be deceiving, as was drilled into him repeatedly during his training.

"Gro, check the engineering section. Freen, with me on the bridge. Timeo, check the staterooms."

"Sir, yes, sir!" loyally recited Timeo and started with the nearest chamber.

It was spartan, barely furnished at all beyond the essential necessities. He poked into the cabinet, under the mattress, checked the dirty laundry pile. There was a computer here, but it was protected with a password, so he let it be. Overall, nothing interesting.

The next one was even less thought-provoking. It looked good as new, as though nobody had lived here in a week, since last clean-up. The trash bin included several plastic trays left after the space rations have been eaten out of them, and that was pretty much the extent of the habitation. Timeo dutifully checked over all the likely places where smugglers were supposed to hide their contraband, and to his dismay, found nothing.

The third stateroom was, well, disorderly to the extreme. It reminded him of his brother Lemm, who was never in any sort of armed forces, and didn't get any sort of discipline out of it. His room was always a horrid mess and their mother always got on Timeo's case to make his brother clean it up, because her admonishments could not produce effects. There were dirty clothes everywhere, the trash had overflown with rubbish of various sorts... was that a rat? An actual rat on a spaceship? Timeo found more offenses against cleanliness – the sheets on the bed that had probably been made last year, were obviously never changed. A pile of reading and watching material was strewn about the room, in a significant part adult entertainment the likes of which were routinely confiscated from the barracks whenever an inspection rolled by. The only thing lacking was somebody having shat on the floor. Timeo's rifling through the room certainly improved on the amount of order he had found. Sickened, he left for the final stateroom, wishing he didn't need to have his helmet off for olfactory inspection.

Gro was interrogating two of the crewmen just outside.

"Don't bother talking to him, he's mute. And dumb," said an older man, scruffy-looking, with obvious cybernetic modifications on the side of his face. It creeped Timeo out – the man must have had half his skull replaced with augments. He was standing next to a bent and dessicated person, clearly ancient, dressed in a brown sack-like robe, supporting himself on a medical cane.

"Isn't that deaf-and-dumb, not mute and dumb?" Gro inquired.

"Uh, yeah. I meant to say that. Deaf-and-dumb, but kind-hearted!" he patted the gramps on the back, nearly toppling him over.

Timeo went into the fourth and final stateroom. This one was more used than the two clean ones, and liberally strewn with books – philosophy, religion, psychology, politics, the works. There was a large suitcase with some clothes, which Timeo searched. He flipped through the books to see if they didn't have any hidden guns in them, not bothering to read past their titles. He had to admit that he preferred the disorderly bastard's taste in literature.

Overall, he was disappointed. Nothing he found was even remotely illegal. Slightly sullen, he made his way to the bridge.

The Sarge was interrogating the woman, who appeared to be the Captain of this boat, while Freen was checking out the bridge for hidden compartments.

"So you're saying that you're carrying nothing, and going to the Commonwealth to pick up whatever you can there, for trade elsewhere. This about the story you want to tell me?"

"Um. Yes, sir. That's it. Sir." How that woman came to be the commander of this vessel escaped Timeo's imagination – he just couldn't believe it, just from under a minute of looking at this nervous, stammering, asocial wreck of a human being.

"A likely story... Timeo, what's the word?"

"Clean, sir! Uh, I mean, so to speak. There's no contraband in the staterooms, sir."

"Go help Gro, then. Now, you, missy, need to explain to me just how you are trying to turn a profit on..."

Timeo saluted and marched over to engineering. "Gro! Hey, Gro, I'm to help you out."

Silence met him.

"Gro? The hell are you hiding? This is no time for games. I'll report you if this is another one of your practical jokes, damn you."

Timeo looked left. He looked right. Nobody. There was just the power plant, the M-Drive installation, a computer terminal.

"Guess he must be checking the cargo bay..." Private Timeo said to himself, whereupon something heavy landed on his shoulders.

He reacted instinctively, grabbing whatever it was on his back, trying to flip it forward, but even as he did, something white and smelly covered his mouth and eyes.

Timeo inhaled and was lost to the world.

ooo

The SDB Captain was annoyed at this routine inspection. In his books, anyone who submitted to a search certainly wasn't worth searching, but you couldn't just call off the whole thing, because people would learn to submit and wait for the trouble to go away. So they had to actually go down and rifle through some spacers' belongings and open up sealed crates. He and his pilot waited for the customs marines to finish up their look-through. The valve behind them opened.

"Done already, Sarge? What took you so long?" he asked without turning around.

The Sergeant didn't answer. Well, that was mighty uncharacteristic of him, he frowned at the display, and turned around to glare at the marine for being surly. The Sergeant had his helmet on – probably forgot to turn on the sound amplification.

"Sarge!" the Captain said loudly. "Turn on your sound, dammit!"

Wait a moment – this wasn't the Sarge, it was someone else in his vacc suit! His hand went to his sidearm, but the stranger's hand was faster – and pierced the Captain's larynx, as a hot knife pierces soft butter. The Captain's world suddenly narrowed to a point, as he struggled with the blade embedded in his neck, having gone through his helmet. All he could see was the hilt sticking out in front.

The pilot screamed something the Captain couldn't quite make out, then screamed in pain. Through the haze of agony and rapidly dwindling bloody supply to the brain, he realized that before he died, he needed to do something. Something important.

Steeling his will, he flipped himself over and grabbed the side of the pilot's chair. His vision was nearly gone – but there it was, the object of his singular desire. The emergency signal broadcast button. The Captain reached for it, grabbed the cover and tore it off. With the last ounce of strength, he raised his hand to press down...

...and was yanked back.

"Naughty, naughty!" said a man's voice.

The Captain gave in to despair and lost consciousness.

ooo

"Well, this is a fine mess," Kaarin said, wiping the sweat off his brow.

"Was this truly necessary?" asked Yosef, kneeling down at the body of the pilot. Kaarin had shot him in the chest just a moment ago and the hole still smouldered. "Deo Patre nostro, nostrae potentiam ad generationem, team providentiam flectit providimus..." he intoned in a language so long dead that it had been that way before the Solomani reached for the stars.

"Us or them... Father," the Captain begrudgingly accepted the diplomat's other function.

"This one is still alive," said Arthur, indicating the SDB's Captain, whom he had stuck with his monoknife. "But he won't be for much longer."

"Then get him to a cryoberth – they probably have a few in the back. This one too. They are dead less than a minute. Under four minutes, they can probably be saved."

Yosef did not need to be told twice. Enlisting Arthur's help, they transported first the unconscious and bleeding-out Captain, then the dead helmsman.

"Engi!" Kaarin called. Sai Marte appeared shortly, busy removing the excess padding from her vacc suit. "Find me this boat's comm logs, and give your best attempt at making me a soundboard of their common chatter. I need to convey a routine inspection success to traffic control, or customs, or whoever. You have half an hour, before they start getting suspicious, I figure. Get to it."

"Yes, sir!" the woman moved past Kaarin and began operating the SDB's Captain's console.

Kaarin himself went over to check up on the men. They were just closing the second low-berth, having deposited the two corpses or near-corpses.

"Is it true that the Imperium has the power to bring people back from the dead, Captain?" asked Yosef.

"Sort of," shrugged Kaarin. "I wouldn't want to go through the experience. But yeah, suppose you've got your brain intact, and you haven't been dead for too long while out of the freezer, and you happen to be somewhere with the correct technological level and no prohibition on reanimation, and you've got two years' salary saved up... it might work. It's far from perfect. You hear horror stories about people waking up completely different than they were before they had their encounter with the reaper, or being obviously damaged in the mind, or becoming vegetables even though the body is returned to life."

"Man attempting to play God seldom works out well," Yosef nodded. "What's the plan?"

"Bullshit our way in, essentially. I have Sai on the computer, making me a soundboard to use against the customs control."

"Not much of a plan."

"It's what we've got. Help me get the unconscious ones to the berths too. Can't have them waking up on us. Then we can get started on the bullshit part."

The two nodded assent and followed him to continue their grim labours.

ooo

"Customs control, this is 'Chalice'. No contraband. We're returning to our patrol," said the voice of the frozen Captain.

"Wonderful. You deserve a raise, Engi."

"If you say so, sir."

"SDB 'Chalice, this is customs control, did you find out why the 'Luxantus' wasn't showing up on our sensors?" asked the other side of communications seconds later.

"Damn. They weren't supposed to ask that! Arthur, what do I choose?" Kaarin asked advice of the most deceitful of his crew.

"This one," the agent pointed at a button. Kaarin pressed it, before the pause got too long.

"Damn sunspots," said the soundboard.

"What the hell? Sunspots? You've got be kidding me. I can't really make them out at this range with you so close. Can you see them on your sensors?"

"Affirmative, control. No suspicious activity."

"Uh... Ugh. That's it, I'm advancing the scheduled check-up of those systems, because sun spots shouldn't affect them the way they did here. Customs control, out."

One moment, there was tense silence, then everyone cheered in their own way – Kaarin with an enthusiastic "Hell yeah!", Arthur with a wry smile, Yosef with a religious gesture and a prayer and Sai with incomprehension of what her fellow primates were doing.

"Engi, get this ship set with an autopilot set to resume whatever they were doing before they got called in to deal with us," Kaarin said, not wasting time. "We're going to the Western Commonwealth, just like we planned. They'll notice the deception eventually, but we want that to be as late as possible. Hell, if we can be that lucky, deal with everything here, leave, and only then have them wise up to the ruse."

"That would be very, very lucky for us," opined Yosef. Sai got to work on the computer, programming a delayed flight path for the SDB.

"That would be about time then – get some at long last," said Kaarin. "Our karma banks should be full to overflowing."

ooo

"Are you certain, Lieutenant?" said the holographic projection of High Admiral Imma Shurt. She was her usual self – middle-aged, but expertly made-up that one might mistake her for a woman half her years, and fit into a uniform that belied the idea of a uniform, in being carefully tailored for maximum visual effect while technically fitting into the solution space that the specifications required. The hologram wasn't very advanced, but neither Griddle nor the Admiral had access to anything better.

"Completely sure, ma'am," he said. "The other party in the comm logs I sent is not Captain Edding."

The High Admiral looked skeptical. "What makes you so sure?" The lack of trust, the suspicion that she showed to him and others really grated after a while. They were all in the same service to the crown, and without fail loyal subjects of the Emperor. But she always treated her fellow officers as if they were possible traitors.

"Admiral, I know the man. We've known each other for five years, since before I began my service in the space force. From that perspective, the conversation 'we' had just minutes ago is so anomalous as to be completely unbelievable."

"Why?"

Griddle proceeded to explain: "Captain Edding is a precise, dutiful man. I have sent him my full appraisal of the suspiciousness of the 'Luxantus', and stressed that he check especially how is it that we could not see the offending vessel on our sensors. I thought they were a smuggler, but this method of evading attention is new to me. The putative Edding who contacted me after their inspection was done mentioned nothing about the primary aspect of the mission, instead declaring that they've found no contraband. When I pressed him on that, he simply stated that the reason for this oddity were sunspots."

"Is there any sunspot activity?"

"No, ma'am. There hasn't been for two years now. That's what I found odd. He sometimes used the 'sunspots' explanation as a joke when I asked him a difficult question, but he'd only once, to my recollection, used that reply in seriousness. And his reply to my incredulity was just brushing me off that he could see the vessel on their sensors and that there was nothing suspicious about the situation. I realized then that I wasn't talking to my friend, but to a recording."

"So you think, what, exactly, happened out there?"

"I think Captain Edding is dead, and so is his crew. I'm not sure how the 'Luxantus' managed that, but I don't see any alternative explanations as to how this situation might have otherwise arisen. I've checked the timing – the inspection took a little too much time, based on previous ones, and there are weird, unnatural pauses in the communication after it, despite lack of a substantial lightspeed delay between us. I am requesting orders on what to do with this situation, Admiral, ma'am."

The High Admiral pursed her lips, looking away from him. This was another feature of their penultimate authority in space – her inability to make snap judgments. She thought deeply about just about every decision. Though the thought was semi-treasonous, Griddle considered just about anyone else to be better for the job than this woman. He would have made a better High Admiral than she was ever likely to.

"I'm not sure I agree with your assessment, Lieutenant," she finally spoke. "I'm authorizing you to deal with the situation as you see fit. High Admiral out."

Griddle very carefully hung up the call, making extremely sure it was off before applying both palms to his ears, in a Mycian gesture of frustration. Well, the High Admiral did have one particular feature that was arguably a good one – she could, and did, delegate.

Steeling himself, Lieutenant Griddle of the Mycian Space Force turned his comm on encrypted broadcast to all units. He was going to prove that he was due a promotion – perhaps not to the very top, where only the high nobility and their spouses had access, but somewhere higher and more important than customs.

"Attention, this is Lieutenant Griddle of Customs Control. Per delegation from the High Admiral, all units converge on the 'Luxantus', as located by its transponder signal. Repeat – attention..."

ooo

"I'm picking up a lot of comm chatter just now," Arthur said from the computer room. "It looks like a broadcast."

"What doe it say?"

"It's encrypted. Early type, I think, but it'll take at least a few hours to crack even that."

"What's your guess, then? What's happening with the boat we released?"

"It's heading along the pre-programmed course as planned. And, ah, here we go."

"I'm not going to like what you've just discovered, am I?" Kaarin grimaced to his console.

"Nope! Every SDB we detected going in, aside from ours, is now on an intercept vector with us."

"Crap! So much for that luck. Can we make it to Commonwealth space before they reach us?"

"Highly unlikely, Captain. They're pulling six gees, most of them. Can't outrun them."

Kaarin flipped the intercom to broadcast. "Listen up, we've been made, or it sure looks like it. We're inside the jump limit, and probably won't make it in time to get across the space borders. We're going to have to pull out. No chances of winning against so many. Buckle up. We're heading back to Tyr."

"You didn't tell them that reversing course is only marginally safer," Arthur said.

"They don't need to know that. Sai probably realizes, and Yosef is non-technical."

"Sure."

Kaarin ignored Arthur and pressed the intercom again. "Ready for five-gee turn in three, two, one!"

The ship did a violent about-face, sustaining extremely uncomfortable gravity for but a few moments, but they were enough – oriented towards the outside of the hundred-diameter limit, they now needed only to fight their way through their own accumulated momentum.

ooo

Upon the raised seat on the luxuriously large bridge sat a man of obvious Solomani descent, subtly different from the mixed breeds of Vilani and Solomani that followed in the wake of the Solomani expansion into the Ziru Sirka. For all his advanced age visible by his gray hair, he was handsome, in a hawkish kind of way. Confidence and smugness radiated from him, command was obviously as natural as walking to him. His many cybernetic augmentations, however, very far from obvious, only routinely detectable with advanced scanning technology.

"Admiral, we've crossed the one-week mark," said the navigator. "We should be coming out of jumpspace any minute now."

"Good," replied the self-styled Lord Admiral Peter the First. "How is crew readiness?"

"The second shift is awake and at their stations, sir. We will wake the first if there is need for this, given the situation in the system upon arrival."

"Excellent. I don't foresee trouble. According to the dispatches, the Mycian government is ready to ally themselves with me, in return for seizing control over their quaint little planet."

"Are we actually going to go through with that? Keep our word?" asked the comms officer. She had other duties also, in part this – questioning his decisions, lest his bridge become an echo chamber.

"I always keep my word, Isis," said the Lord Admiral. "You should all know this by now. My word is not given lightly, and is my bond. So long as they fulfill their end of the bargain, I see no reason – absolutely no reason – to betray them." He didn't explain to them the basis of his reasoning, which was grounded in the study of old Solomani pre-stellar warlords, especially the Borjigin dynasty of the largest continent – there was no need to. They knew their jobs, he knew himself. That was all that was needed.

The viewscreens on the walls and ceiling of the bridge turned black, from their bright blue.

"Jump exit!" announced the navigator. "Sensor analysis of stellar class confirms this is Caldos. We've arrived, sir."

The Lord Admiral grinned. "We are in business."


	11. Chapter 9

"Just like old times, eh, Mr. Priest?" Arthur leaned out of his chair to look at Yosef. "Escaping from the Mycians in the Caldos system."

"I sincerely hope you don't expect me to function as our gunner this time around!" snorted the old man. "I recall my contribution in that role was minimal."

"This time we're fully crewed. When they catch up with us, I'm going to do the gunnery work myself. Do you know how to operate shipboard sensors and comms?"

"Marginally. They're not so different from other types of standard electronics."

"Standard electronics from Tyr, you mean?"

"What do you mean by that, Mr. Agent?"

"You're obviously more than a few decades out of school, and this isn't a Tyrian starship. I mean by that that your knowhow may be limited in ways you aren't expecting."

"Do you want me to take over from you, or not?"

Arthur paused. "Well, I guess gunnery is the more important task, when it comes to it. Very well – I accept your credentials."

Yosef shook his head. "Shouldn't you be paying attention to the sensors now, when it is the important task at hand?"

"I should, indeed," said the Agent and turned back to the terminal, and reacted with visible surprise. "Captain, jump exit outside the hundred diameter limit!"

"Who is it?"

"Initial size reading indicates between fifteen hundred and twenty-five hundred dtons! Their transponder came online – it identifies as the 'Pagaton' of the Pagaton March Fleet! We're effectively on an intercept course for it!"

They could both hear the Captain cursing through the bulkheads and door.

ooo

"Scan complete," the sensors officer reported. The Pagaton was equipped with the very best in sensor technology – that money could buy, anyway. Unfortunately, among the priceless, irreplaceable artifacts, there weren't any that improved upon the admittedly already impressive array of sensors that the Imperium could field. "We're on the edge of Mycian space, sir, and there appears to be a pursuit in progress. The Mycian fleet is chasing down a mining ship identifying itself as the free trader 'Luxantus'. The escapee is headed right for us with their present course – but reflection data is coming back severely degraded; I suspect they have stealth coating. Could be a smuggler or dissident against the authorities. Shall we intervene, sir?"

"No," replied the Lord Admiral. "We don't have a dog in this fight yet, so to speak. Have any of the other ships arrived yet?"

"No, sir. Provided none of them jumped inaccurately, they should arrived within the hour."

"I know," he replied, without a trace of doubt or uncertainty. "The jump coordinator has not yet let us down. While we wait for them to arrive – comms, get me a connection with the planet surface. I wish to speak with our allies."

"Yes, sir!"

The lightspeed delay was tolerable – only a few seconds. He didn't have to wait long until his subordinate negotiated a direct connection to the Mycian Empire's capital.

"Greetings and welcome to Mycia, Lord Admiral!" said Chancellor Baminakkur. "We have been expecting you for some weeks now."

"And greetings to you too, Chancellor. I had been held up beyond my ability to affect things at Connaught. A dreadful place, with insufficient facilities to provide adequate refuelling and supplies to my fleet when we are in a rush. How go matters on the surface? All well?"

"Quite well, Lord Admiral," the Chancellor smiled. "The Emperor is fully willing to form an alliance with you, on the terms you proposed. We are ready to proceed when you are. The Commonwealth and the Dominion will fall swiftly against our combined might! All of Caldos will be united under the banners of the Mycian Empire!"

"Just so. In the meantime, I notice you appear to have some minor issues with shipping? If I am not mistaken, your fleet is currently chasing down some tiny craft coming in our direction?"

The Chancellor blinked in surprise. "I wasn't notified of this."

"Then perhaps we should include the commander of your space forces in our little conference?"

"Yes, that seems prudent, Lord Admiral. Issuing call now."

Twenty seconds later, the viewscreen split between the golden-robed Chancellor and the black-and-red uniformed High Admiral of the Mycian Space Force.

"Can I help you, Chancellor? And, oh, you're the Lord Admiral, aren't you?"

"I am indeed," the eponymous one smiled smugly. "I see my reputation precedes me."

"I have been briefed on our plans for planetary unification," explained the woman. "Frankly, I expected more warning before we got right to the smash-and-grab. Going through the proper channels would have been very polite."

"Politeness is not required," shot back Baminakkur. "Imma, who is it that your ships are chasing down?"

"Oh, you heard about that? Just some putative smuggler. One of my customs officers thinks they've... well, disabled one of our patrol craft, suborned it and somehow used the Captain's own voice to cheat us into thinking we still had control over it."

"What does the supposedly suborned boat say in response to queries now?" the Lord Admiral skipped the several intervening steps, putting himself in the shoes of the tentative crew-killing, ship-suborning smugglers.

"Um, I don't know, I delegated the task to the officer who spotted the potential issue. I'm not sure I agree with his assessment," the High Admiral replied.

"Then perhaps we should add just that officer to the conference. I must say, this is turning out a very exciting entry to a system. Comms, the main viewscreen is getting crowded, use the left and right too."

Fifteen seconds later, Lieutenant Griddle joined the conversation.

"Ma'am? Chancellor! Um, I'm afraid I don't know who-"

"This is the Lord Admiral Peter the First, our soon-to-be ally," quickly explained the Chancellor. "The High Admiral has delegated a task to you. What's the status since then?"

"Sir. I've sent all available craft to pursue the fugitives in a standard entrapment pattern. We expect to be in extreme weapons' range within half an hour from now. They cannot escape the system unless they wish to do it from inside the gravity well, and they might not have fuel to do so anyway, given that they just arrived. I'm certain that we can intercept and handle the rogue ship."

"What about the inspection vessel?" the Lord Admiral asked before the High Admiral could.

"I've been trying to raise it since. No reply, no deviation from its standard patrol pattern. I believe it is on autopilot, sir. I've dispatched a shuttle from the spaceport to intercept it and recover it."

"With medical personnel, marines, and explosive technicians?"

"Yes, sir," the Lieutenant said reflexively. "That's standard procedure in this case."

"Very well. This matter seems well-handled for now. I must congratulate you on good choice of subordinates, Madam Admiral," Peter I inclined his head slightly towards the woman.

She suppressed a snort. "Do we need to take up more of the Lieutenant's valuable time? I'm sure it is better employed running this operation, than talking with us."

"That might be. Thank you for your input, Lieutenant."

"Doing my job, sir!" said Griddle. Comms removed him from the conference.

"Now then, I believe we can resume our discussion. It may be even augmented with the presence of the High Admiral here."

"Glad to be here," mumbled the navy commander, relieved how things went from a possible dressing down to a congratulation.

"Chancellor, can you give me a digest of the events since the last monthly dispatch?"

"With pleasure!"

ooo

In Kaarin's long service in the Scouts, he had sometimes had the questionably valuable opportunity of being in a situation that resembled placing oneself between the anvil and the onrushing smith's hammer. This was one of them – the Mycian navy at his back, and now the Pagaton in front of him. Not stopping to curse luck, fate and what the world was built on, he changed course, perpendicular to the system ecliptic plane. Their course was, of course, not immediately different. They still had momentum built up from their last change in heading, and now they lost even more of their advantage against the incoming Mycians.

He turned on the intercom, on broadcast. "We are well and truly fucked," Kaarin stated plainly. "I am now accepting suggestions on how to get out of this pickle. Any suggestion that gets us somewhere that isn't 'all over the place as distributed atoms' or 'imprisoned by our enemies' is welcome."

"Do not give in to the deadly sin of despair, Captain," replied Yosef calmly. "So long as there is life, there is Hope."

"Platitudes unwelcome!" snapped Kaarin.

"How about something less of a suggestion, but more of a status report," said Arthur. "We actually have good news! The Pagaton is not moving in to assist the system defense boats – it's just sitting there, at the jump limit, minding its own business. I think it has to do with the fact that we've never actually identified as anything other than the 'Luxantus', meaning the Lord Admiral might be thinking it's an internal issue that he's not going to waste any firepower helping the locals out with."

"Okay, that is good news!"

"The bad news is that it did scan us with active sensors and our course diversion means that we'll be in the system longer than we otherwise would have been. This will be a harder fight than we expected."

"As long as it's a fight we have an option of winning. Sorry for snapping at you, old man."

"It's understandable under the circumstances, Captain, you are duly forgiven."

"Alright. We follow a slightly amended plan – flying away and trying not to die, mark two."

ooo

"...and that's pretty much it," concluded the Chancellor. "I also have a collection of detailed reports from my underlings, if you wish to review it in-depth later, Lord Admiral."

"Simply send it over. It will not take as long as you think for me to process it."

"If you say so."

When the upload came through to the ship's computer, the Lord Admiral accessed it remotely. To outside observers, he sat quietly in his chair for about thirty seconds, doing absolutely nothing. His crew were well-acquainted with his eccentricities, but for the Chancellor and the High Admiral this was new.

"Lord Admiral?"

"Chancellor. I believe there is a minor problem with your executive summary," said the warlord. "You have largely skipped over details concerning the vessel that the Tyrians used to convey their delegation. Understandably, this was a minor fact, but relevant."

"I don't quite understand the relevance of it, still," admitted the Mycian.

"Your data includes detailed readings of the Imperial vessel, when it was coming in, when it was impounded, and when it was escaping your system." Without going through the formality of using his officers, the Lord Admiral added still images of the starship to the conference's video stream. "Compare this to the reconstructed imaging we have taken after we've arrived in the system – reconstructed because the ship appears to have high-absorbance stealth shielding retrofitted. This appears to be a standard Type S Scout ship, used commonly in the Imperium as a general purpose small starship. However, notice the upper-starboard section." He indicated the place on the displayed picture. "This is a plate of crystaliron armour, reconstituted after taking battle damage. I won't bore you with the process it is accomplished by, but sufficed to say that while it produces adequate results in terms of restored aerodynamicity and is more economical than simply replacing the whole plate section, the repaired regions still visually show signs of the damage that was inflicted to them originally. In this case, notice the exact lines of the probable high-energy laser hit." Computer-generated traces appeared. "Now compare that to the images taken from your data dump."

"Those are nearly identical!" the High Admiral noticed.

"Excellent deduction," said the warlord emotionlessly. "In conclusion, this is the same ship, the 'Imminent Misjump'. I would also wager that its occupants are quite likely to be the same people who escaped you these few weeks ago."

"This is most serious," said the Chancellor worriedly. "I don't suppose you would be willing to lend a hand towards preventing these spies from exiting our space a second time?"

"I might, in fact. Given the lack of absolute haste, and the fact that the rest of my fleet is yet to arrive, let's go over the mutual assistance treaty one more time..."

ooo

"Is it still not moving?" Kaarin asked.

"Dead in space – relative to the planet, at least. I think they have to be expending considerable gees to keep their position, actually, but from our standpoint, they're static," replied Arthur.

"I don't like it."

"That's very negative of you, Captain. I must say that it's not doing much to help morale aboard the ship," said the priest.

"That's because I'm sick of the worst run of bad luck I've had in over ten years. I'll accept when something isn't as horribly bad as it seems at first, like this – but I don't have to like it, and I suspect it's all just some kind of elaborate ruse against us."

"There's no ruse required. Do the odds not rest firmly with them?" Yosef asked.

"Now who's being negative? Yes, we're quite likely to become crippled in space, will probably die."

Kaarin paused, and the others didn't say anything for a while.

"Listen," he began again, "all of you, as far as I know, are volunteers, myself included. Actually, did you volunteer, Engi?"

"I was given the opportunity to refuse the assignment without a black mark on my record, sir," said Sai Marte from engineering.

"Right. So everyone here is a volunteer. We knew what we were getting into, and we're in a bad situation. You got lucky once, last time around, but they're not likely to fuck up the pursuit again. Not all of us might make it out of this, we might end up as monoatomic dust drifting aimlessly in deep space. But you know what? To hell with that! We're not helpless, we're aboard an armed starship, with the best crew I could hope for. If the Mycians should want to end our lives here, I say we give them a taste of their own medicine! Members of the Imperium and people of Tyr alike, we will show them the true meaning of mettle! And should the Pagaton intervene? Let them come! This ship has served well over a century in the Scouts, and survived every encounter it had. Can they say the same of their own ships? Can they say that they couldn't have better crews? No! When we get into firing range, I say we give them hell. Are you with me?!"

"I'm with you, sir!" dutifully answered Petty Officer Sai Marte.

"I don't have any other choice, do I?" Arthur expressed his support.

"God is with us, Captain. Who can be against us?" Yosef said solemnly. "In these possibly final moments, I would like to express my sincere appreciation of associating with all of you. In fact, I would like to extend each of you an offer of induction into the Church. The ceremony is brief in its most basic form."

Kaarin was about to react with his usual cynicism, but then laughed instead. "You know, priest? I'd take an offer from the Evil One himself, in our current situation, if he promised to help us somehow. I'll take you up on that one, so long as we don't endanger ourselves while we go through with it."

"Anyone else?"

"Sir, I'll do it too if the Captain thinks it will help," said Sai Marte.

"I'll pass," said Arthur.

"Very well. I'll get the water," he said and went off to gather the ritual materials.

ooo

"Sir, jump exits detected. The 'Fury of Mora' and the 'Savage' have entered the Caldos system. Scatter within tolerable limits," said the sensors officer.

"Excellent. What of the others?"

"They haven't... more jump exits detected! The 'Prediction', the 'Inevitable Vengeance' and the 'Isolation' have entered Caldos. The 'Fury of Mora' is launching its boats."

"Right on time. Signal my fleet, standard sphere formation. ETA to formation?"

"Ten minutes, sir."

The Lord Admiral smiled, getting comfortable on his throne. This was going to be a nice way to show off the power of his force. He would have otherwise preferred to capture the tiny scoutship intact and possibly integrate it into his fleet, but in the present circumstances, it was a better opportunity to show off the guns. If the Mycians didn't know to de-facto accept being a vassal state, not just the de-jure alliance, they would certainly after this show of force, on their own behalf. While this might have been adequately done via the overapplication of force on groundside, squashing the Mycians' petty little rival states, the warlord knew not to wave atrocities in the face of the Imperium, even if these worlds were not part of it. There would come a time to take the fight to the Third Imperium itself, but that could hopefully be delayed until there was a chance at victory. Some day – some day hopefully soon.

ooo

The ceremonies were extremely basic, just as Yosef had said. He said some words, poured a little water on his and Sai's heads, and pronounced them members of the Universal Assembly, and thereby first in line to a heavenly afterlife. Luckily, according to the priest, full understanding of the faith was not required. The process took not more than five minutes, in all.

"Captain!" Arthur announced from his post. "We're reading multiple jump exits! They're all using the same transponder allegiance code as the Pagaton!"

"Is it too late or too early to file a complaint form about our blessings?" sighed Kaarin, sitting back at the helm, and resealing his vacc suit. "Nevermind. The situation is not worse that it was before. What's a few more warships, if that flagship could wipe us by itself? What are they doing, Arthur?"

"Forming up. Some kind of protective arrangement around the 'Pagaton'. Also, I think you'll be pleased to note that we're in range of long-range beam weapons. One of the Mycian boats has already begun taking pot-shots at us, but their gunner is no more skilled than Yosef, it appears."

"I'd say 'evasive maneuvers' if I weren't the one to make them in the first place," said Kaarin, flipping a random-walk switch on his control board. "This'll slow us down. Arthur, get to the turret controls. Yosef, take over the sensors. Notify me of anything interesting you see that you think I might want to know about, just like your predecessor did. Sai, prepare for emergency repairs."

The crew said their aye-ayes and yes-sirs and jogged off to their duty stations. Kaarin, after everyone got to their posts, closed the internal doors and began depressurization – slow, so as not to interfere with everyone's jobs – in order to forestall fires on board. Since everyone was wearing vacc suits ever since they arrived in the system, there was no actual need for air, unless the fight went for over six hours, which would take a considerable miracle. They would likely either be dead, or free to leave in under one hour, much less six.

"Captain," Yosef said. "The sensors are showing something strange. What do the blue blinking rectangles mean?"

"Those are jump exits!"

"Press F-V and use the arrow keys to cycle between contacts," Arthur instructed over internal radio.

"Oh, I get it now! Wait, these names seem familiar..."

ooo

Commodore Hayes returned to his flagship, the ISS 'Black Swan', after his 'negotiations' with the troublesome Tyrians. He was very thankful that he didn't have to interact with the damned Imperial Intelligence agent more than was absolutely necessary. Eye-eye agents were Trouble with a capital-T, in his books. Now that their ship had jumped, just an hour ago, he relaxed. Those people might have the right idea that this warlord would be trouble, eventually, but Hayes had his mandate, and was willing to live and let live. Let the entire main burn down, for all he cared – they'd just make arrangements with the successor government, be in Peter I 'the Conqueror' or anyone else. The Imperium did not meddle into the affairs of foreign states unless there was some benefit to the Emperor to be had. Here, involvement was likely unnecessary and would very definitely endanger the mission of keeping watch over the Research Base – and the quarrelsome Dostoevskyan government. Without his force here, the separatists may just come out on top, and the loyalists would be in a severely disadvantageous position, without the support of Imperial warships in orbit.

He sipped a cup of high-quality, imported stim and reviewed his messages, in the comforts of his splendid quarters aboard the 'Swan'. Maintenance report, fuel requisition, disciplinary action for a marine, another disciplinary action, shore leave request, multimedia message from Intelligence... Hayes blinked, stopping. What did Intelligence want now? He put it on the holoprojector.

The unwelcome face of that agent smiled at him.

"Good evening, Commodore? How is your day? My day is fine, although by the time I had the prerequisites to send this missive, we were already en-route to our destination," said the recording. "I recall that you were opposed to committing forces to the defense of the Sindalian main. This is somewhat problematic, since it is counter to the purposes of Imperial Intelligence and the interests of the Imperium as a whole. I would like you to reconsider-"

"I'd like you to try to convince me!" muttered Hayes, grip tightening on his cup.

"-but I realize that you are a man of your word. If you said that you won't do something, then you will not, obviously. Imagine my surprise, then, when I went through your mailbox and personal files, to see a completely different sort of person. Without a doubt, someone is pretending to be you, an Imperial officer. Indeed, what would a happily married man, with several children and a loving wife, see in torrid affairs with the Duchess of Csim and your own quartermaster simultaneously, presumably without either of them knowing about the other?"

The Commodore's heart stopped, the cup falling from his hand, and crashing to the metal floor. He didn't even notice.

"This must have been some sort of mistake," continued the hologram. "I fully intend to get to the bottom of this, expose the scoundrel who has broken into your ship's account to besmirch your spotless character, and fully exonerate you before the public opinion."

The recorded Arthur paused. Hayes' eye twitched slightly.

"Now, then, to business," the agent resumed, more somber this time. "Commodore, you will temporarily abandon your station at Dostoevsky, and come to the defense of the Sindalian main. You will continue to provide aid until such a time that the menace of the 'Lord Admiral' is vanquished. How you do it is largely up to you, but should you fail to visibly help out in this matter, certain findings will be forwarded to the three women named. I trust that you value the necessity of secrecy as much as any Imperial agent, and will not disappoint me. This message will self-delete in five seconds."

The recording shut down.

Commodore Hayes deliberated for a full minute before pressing the call adjutant button. The young man was on the scene momentarily.

"Jim, I have orders to the fleet. Ready for departure for Caldos within six hours. Jump in formation. Notify the XO and my Captains, they'll take it from there," he told him, looking at the sad remains of a stimulant cup. "And clean up this mess, while you're at it."

ooo

"That's the Imperial ships from Dostoevsky! 'Karma' and 'Revolution' have entered the system, and here comes 'Cyclops'!" Yosef announced. "More ships are arriving in!"

"Hell yes!" Kaarin clapped his hands forcefully.

"Now do you believe the power of the Lord, Captain?"

"Hell yes!"

"Not the most appropriate affirmation, but I'll take it."

Arthur grinned silently in the turret.


	12. Chapter 10

The planetoid belts in the Caldos system enjoyed some exploitation by enterprising individuals who took the risk of migrating into independent systems without the technological base to exploit them themselves. On one of the larger asteroids within the inner belt, a Florian prospector had set up a tiny mining colony, composed of his immediate family and a few friends. They mined nearby rocks and transported the fruit of their efforts to whichever of the three powers offered the best price. Among their equipment was counted an advanced sensor array which they've used to great effect, ferreting out information from passing asteroids, greatly aiding their ability to find precious metals. It also had some other applications.

"Hey, pa! Come look! There's a battle going on!" shouted the miner's firstborn son.

"Pirates?"

"Don't think so," he pointed to the wallscreen. "There's like three forces here!"

"Hoo boy. That's the Mycians there, those I think are Imperial, and that there's..." said the father, coming into the living room of their hab module. "...Pagaton March Navy? What the hell's that?"

"Never heard of it, pa."

"What are you two shouting about?" asked the miner's wife, coming in, drying a plate.

"Honey, better call in the boys and girls home. They don't want to miss this, and they want to be somewhere they can get to the ship right quick. There's a major space battle going on in around Caldos!"

"Oh, dear," she put the plate away and went to use the comm.

"Set it on active," the miner said. "Let's see who brought what, exactly."

Lightspeed sensors were limited by the delay, but they did their job admirably well, helped somewhat by the fact that all the ships were still running transponders.

The Mycian Empire fielded its entire space force, which included only non-starships. Their Powers That Be had decided that the advantages of more firepower and speed outweighed the disadvantages of not being able to travel the stars – their primary enemies were located right there on the planet, and also fielded space navies. They had nine ships, six 100 dton designs, three 200 dton designs – all substantially outdated and outperformed by even the smallest modern starships, but each had at least one laser, and most had two – and of course, their flagship 'Mycia's Pride', a 300 dton discount Corsair. The miners were quite familiar with all of them, due to their many repeated trips to the planet and back – their mining ship could give any of them a run for their money, probably, if they invested in something more powerful than a discount pulse laser to deter opportunists.

"Those Imperials, I bet they're from Dostoevsky, pa," said the son.

"What makes you think that?"

"That one's the Black Swan, pa," he pointed to one of the blips. "That's what the flagship of the Imperial picket there is called. The traders said so."

"You could be onto something, son."

The rest of the Imperial ships were quite unknown to them. They were just arriving in the system, but by the time the spectators got to enumerating them, their staggered arrival over the course of twenty minutes was over. There were eleven of them, led by the 3000 dton cruiser – well into the category of small capital ships – the 'Black Swan', supported primarily by the 1200 dton 'Poseidon', the 1000 dton 'Unity II' and the 800 dton 'Cyclops'. In addition, they had seven ships between 300 and 600 dtons acting as screens.

"That's gotta be the entire picket," whistled one of the miner's friends, having just arrived at the habitation module. "Whoever's it that they're fighting is in a world of hurt. That force coulda taken the whole main by themselves, if they wanted to."

"Not if they didn't want to piss off the Aslan and us," said the miner, thumping himself in his Florian chest.

"Wonder who's it they're fighting."

"Bet ya they're pirates. Maybe Vargr?"

The force identifying itself as the Pagaton March Navy was significantly smaller, in terms of size, from either of the other parties to the encounter. However, while the others were scattered in an envelopment maneuver – as the Mycians were, with their flagship only beginning to accelerate towards the fighting, now that the Imperial fleet entered the system – or having just arrived, disorganized, the Pagatonians had the advantage of already having achieved combat formation. Their commander apparently decided for mutually overlapping point-defense over increased firepower of a flatter arrangement. The 2000 dton 'Pagaton' was in the center of a sphere of its screens – which displaced between 300 and 700 tons. According to active sensors, they also had something like large shuttles or 100 dton combat boats which weren't running transponders.

"Anyone ever heard of this 'Pagaton March'?" asked the miner's friend.

"Nope," said the son. His father shook his head.

"Well, I sort of wonder on whose side they are on."

"I think they're allied with the Mycians!"

"Why do you think that, boy?"

"I've been looking at them when they arrived. The Mycians didn't think them a threat, like at all, they just continued doing what they were doing before."

"What are they doing?" asked the miner's wife. "They look like they're all over the place without rhyme or reason."

"They're chasing this li'l bugger here," the son indicated a 100 dton blip named the 'Luxantus'. "Must be some sorta bootlegger or something. They're mighty intent on catching him."

"Hey, they changed transponder," noted the miner's friend.

"'Imminent Misjump'?" read out the wife. "Who the hell names their ship like that?"

ooo

"This is the Imperial Scoutship 'Imminent Misjump' calling the 'Black Swan', please respond!" Kaarin barely managed to remove undue excitement from his voice. "We are pursued by the Mycian space force, requesting immediate assistance!"

The ship was shaken by a laser hit.

"Damage report!"

"Fuel tank hit, sir!" reported Sai. "Minor leak detected. Sealing off internal chambers."

Kaarin got back to piloting.

"'Imminent Misjump', this is the Imperial Cruiser 'Black Swan'," replied someone, probably a communications officer on board of the vessel. "Your request for aid is received and we are en-route to assist. ETA is 15 minutes until we can provide joint point-defense."

The Imperial fleet was only partially formed, but started moving at two gravities, letting ships with faster engines catch up on the way.

The turret hummed deeply in discharge. "Yosef, get me confirmation if I hit that nearest defense boat," Arthur demanded.

"They've slowed their acceleration, I think you did!"

"Excellent, will continue hounding that one. What're the Pagatonians doing, anyway?"

ooo

"This is Commodore Hayes of the Imperial Expeditionary Force to Dostoevsky, to the Captain of the starship 'Pagaton' and associated fleet," began the gaunt man, calmly, without a spare visible emotion. "Per out mutual assistance charter with the Imperial Interstellar Scout Service, in addition to our oaths to protect citizens of the Third Imperium, wherever they may be found, we are coming to assist the IISS 'Imminent Misjump', effectively immediately. You are warned that any hostile action towards this task force, or the named starship may constitute an act of war against His Imperial Highness, Emperor Strephon Aella."

Lord Admiral Peter listened to the end, then mentally pressed the record button.

"This is Lord Admiral Peter the First, of the flagship 'Pagaton', to Commodore Hayes of the 'Black Swan'," he said deliberately, "if that is truly who you are. You may be enlightened to learn that the crew of the starship 'Imminent Misjump' has perpetrated acts of murder, piracy and smuggling within the territorial space of the Mycian Empire. Given that they did so under a false transponder also lends some doubt towards their real identity. My fleet and I are moving in to assist our allies, the Mycians, in apprehension of criminal individuals, so that they may stand trial before a court of law, for their misdeeds. Additionally, I would like to point out that this is Caldos, and in particular Mycian space, not Dostoevsky, not the Imperium, and not even an Imperial client state. You have no authority here, especially not over murderers fleeing justice. Any hostile action against my fleet, or that of the Mycian Empire, will be met with disproportionate retribution."

He sent the message. He had to wait only a few minutes for the reply.

"Lord Admiral, as a citizen of the Imperium yourself, you are commanded to stand down, reverse course and leave the system," said Hayes. "You have ten minutes to comply."

The warlord sighed.

"Commodore, as a citizen of the Imperium, and ducal scion, in addition to being a full admiral, I outrank you. Any action against me may constitute treason. Proceed at your own risk."

There was no verbal reply.

"Attention all ships," he sent to his fleet, via short range laser comm. "Focus beam fire on ships as indicated by fleet fire control. Save at least thirty percent of your beam and sandcaster capacity on point defense. Concentrate all missile launches on the 'Black Swan'. Good luck, gentlemen."

ooo

High Admiral Shurt sweated as if she were on the carpet before her own Emperor – so much her make-up was starting to smear.

"Turn down the damn heating!" she ordered her engineer. "Why is it so damn hot in here?!"

Her engineer knew not to get into a quarrel, and in short order, the bridge was as cool as the breath of death.

Their allies have dutifully transmitted logs of their communiques with the Imperial task force. She didn't expect the outcome. Who exactly would dare to stand up to the Third Imperium, especially when its navy which was right under your nose just happened to outnumber, outdisplace and outgun you? Apparently, the person the Emperor has chosen to ally with. From one perspective, this was the best ally they could have, if he would accept calls to arms against any foe, no matter how powerful. On the other hand, they didn't yet issue any calls to arms! She forwarded her brief assessment to the Emperor and the Chancellor, but they had yet to reply when this – this madman openly defied the Imperial and dared them to attack him. The damn scoutship wasn't worth it! Ten scoutships weren't worth it!

"Ma'am? Any changes changes to our orders?" asked the XO.

She muttered and waffled for a full minute before replying: "No. Keep our heading. Try to avoid fire from the Imperials."

"As you wish, ma'am."

ooo

The three forces closed in towards one point – the present location of the 'Imminent Misjump'. Commodore Hayes studied the situation on his holo-plot.

"Extreme beam range in thirty seconds, sir," mentioned his XO.

"Prepare for a volley. All forward-capable turrets, target the 'Pagaton'. Spread out smart missile launches across the hostile fleet at will," he commanded.

"Aye, sir."

ooo

"Look at all those missile launches, pa!" the young man enthusiastically pointed at the swarm of fast-moving new contacts on their screen. "There must be a thousand of them!"

The two fleets have begun jamming each other, which degraded the signal somewhat, but jammers were to a large extend directional, mostly interfering with the opposing force's ability to acquire sensor locks. Neutral bystanders orthogonal to the plane where the shooting was going on were affected much less, and could still watch with perfectly adequate resolution.

"Lemme see that remote control," one of his dad's employees took the device from his hand. "Let's see, select everything moving faster than six gee, group by approximate vector, presto! Tentative count is at nine hundred, you can read there," he pointed to the corner of the screen. "That's a whole lotta firepower. Your boat's all fueled up, boss? Just in case."

"'Course. If this show threatens to migrate out here, we're leaving on a moment's notice. Jumping like a kilometer away, it'll take a week and things will have probably settled down by then," said the miner.

"Can you put on some music? It's awfully dull to just watch a bunch of dots and numbers!" complained his wife.

"Fine, fine. Classical Florian or Imperial Pop?"

ooo

Both the Imperial and the Pagatonian forces decided for somewhat different plans of action, to deal with their adversaries. In accordance to sound Imperial strategy, Commodore Hayes' force concentrated beam fire on the 'Pagaton', taking adequate means to protect themselves against return fire, especially against their own flagship. In contrast, the warlord's fleet opted to knock out the 'Cyclops' by massed fire from everything but the flagship. Their first exchange was almost simultaneous, happening when they first reached a mutual distance which permitted one to use beam lasers effectively.

With their point-defense focused on protecting the 'Black Swan', in anticipation that the enemy would utilize the same tactic, the 'Cyclops'' defenses were swamped and the ship crippled, sensors damaged beyond repair, its maneuver drives disabled and leaking fuel dangerously fast.

Whereas the 'Pagaton'...

ooo

"The 'Cyclops' is down, sir! Emergency power only, secondary sensors enabled, no thrust!" the damage control officer reported to the Commodore via comm.

"Poor choice of first target," said Hayes plainly. "What's the status of the enemy flagship?"

"It's... untouched, sir!"

"What? How?" the Commodore blinked. "How is that possible?"

"Sir!" spoke up one of the sensors officers. "The 'Pagaton' vanished from our sensor locks when targeted by our volley!"

Commodore Hayes' face did not twist in a fierce snarl, like someone else's in his shoes might have. He just wasn't inclined to react that way, instead reaching for the fleet-broadcast switch.

"Attention all vessels. The enemy flagship is equipped with a black globe generator. Massed fire will be ineffective. Fire at will, according to fleet random seed."

ooo

"Admiral! They've noticed how we evaded their fire. Incoming fire is dispersed and staggered."

The impacts could hardly be felt on the overprotected 'Pagaton'. Damage control crews had the situation well under control – barely any work at all, in fact.

"I didn't expect any less of them. We are fighting the Imperial navy, after all, with all that implies. Screen crew, flicker the globe at fifty percent. Meson gunners, target the 'Black Swan'. Screen Captains, allocate a turret to the 'Black Swan' also, other turrets according to your own judgment. Missiles fire at will."

The Lord Admiral watched as the capacitors for his three meson bays announced readiness one by one, charging up from partial pre-loading. Shortly, they were ready to emit.

"Fire."

ooo

The crew of the 'Black Swan' had precisely no warning what was about to happen to them. While the Imperium did have meson technology, its enemies with one exception largely did not, and the expense meant that remote pickets generally didn't get them and doubly so didn't have meson screens. The 'Black Swan' itself was an older design, with centuries of service, and a few upgrades too few to keep it competitive against bleeding edge Zhodani technology – which it wasn't intended to fight. The best thing it could boast were its six particle bays, and its spinal fusion bay. It had a couple of fusion screens, but no meson screens. For picket duty in the forgotten end of nowhere – even a fairly prestigious nowhere – this was more than sufficient. For getting hit with multiple meson beams, amidst of also being targeted by a diverse array of other beam weapons coming from screen vessels, and also having to shoot down missiles which just happened to be reaching their destination, it was poorly equipped.

However, there is a lot of ruin in a capital ship. Decompression alarms blared throughout the 'Swan'. Fuel leaked through a dozen holes. Volatile equipment caught fire. Crewmen were irradiated. But the ship held.

"Dispatching damage control crews to decks four, six and nine," said Hayes' XO. The bridge was, so far, untouched.

"What's the status of their flagship?"

"They're flickering their screen, sir!"

"That would mean they cannot fire their mesons when their screen is active all the time," the Commodore reasoned. "All ships, target the 'Pagaton' whenever you detect it is flickering its globe generator. Return to firing at will when you detect it putting up an impenetrable barrier!"

ooo

The pressure on the 'Pagaton' increased. Lasers, particle beams and even a stray missile came through – but none of those things really got through the even the relatively thin armour the way the mesons targeting the Imperial flagship did.

"We're getting hit all over, Admiral!" yelled his chief engineer from the aft. "We're going to be outpaced by the damage if this keeps up!"

"You need not keep up indefinitely. Do what you can," the warlord answered. If anyone looked at him just then, they might have seen a somewhat manic grin. The crew was used to that, and tolerated his thrill for battle – chiefly, because he had a tendency to win those fights. "Continue hammering the enemy flagship."

ooo

From the perspective of the miners watching on their planetoid, the battle was much less dramatic. Florian popular music, all of it thoroughly listened to repeatedly in the months spent by the small company there, played in the background.

The most tech-savvy member of the team adjusted the scale. "Here, look. The Imperials have three ships crippled now. They're not going to get back into the fight, I think."

"When did you pick up all this stuff about naval warfare?" asked the miner.

"I was drafted into the Florian Navy, don't you know?" the man shrugged. "Anyway – and look here. The Pagatonians have two ships down, one looks completely out."

"Who's winning?" asked the miner's son.

"Can't tell, really. Too early."

"What are the Mycians doing?"

"Who cares?" replied the ex-navyman. "They're very small fish in this engagement."

ooo

Imma Shurt, also known as the High Admiral of the Mycian Space Forces, cared. She cared even more when, after she gave the order to join their new allies against the Imperials, the Imperials dedicated the frigate 'Niveneh' to fend off the attacks of her force. This resulted in, very shortly, the complete annihilation of all but three of her ships, one of which was her flagship. The two surviving boats broke off from the fight – and the Imperial frigate henceforth ignored them, as they ignored the ship she was on, given that it was still quite a ways away from where the fight was taking place.

"Can't we decelerate any faster?" she asked the pilot.

"You're gonna have to talk to the engineer, ma'am, this is high as the scale goes," replied he.

"Engineering! Get us more deceleration!"

"Aye, ma'am," said the engineer. A minute of disabling safeties later, everyone on board was hit with more gravities than their bodies had room for.

Nobody complained.

ooo

The two forces hammered each other relentlessly, and largely ignored the 'Imminent Misjump', even though it was formally the reason for this whole debacle. After the Mycians made the mistake of shooting at Imperial vessels, they have been effortlessly demolished by one of the Imperial fleet's screens. Yosef provided for some morale improvement by praying into the open comm, and nobody really minded. If appeal to the supernatural was going to keep them from being fired upon by the Pagatonians, Kaarin and the others were more than willing to beg for intercession.

"...Amen."

"Who's winning, Yosef?" demanded Kaarin, decelerating. They were outside of the system's hundred-diameter limit, and could jump at any time... provided nobody noticed their jump drive powering up and shooting them to death for their trouble. "Do we need to make a hasty exit yet?"

"Hard to say. Both forces have lost significant amounts of their smaller ships. The Imperials have four ships in fighting condition. The Pagatonians have two."

"Sounds like we won't have to jump out after all," speculated Arthur.

"Don't jinx-" began Kaarin but was interrupted by Yosef.

"The 'Black Swan' just broke apart!"

"You jinxed it!"

ooo

"All hands, seek lifepods or pressurized fragments! I repeat, all hands, seek lifepods or pressurized fragments!" Commodore Hayes broadcast by radio, since the hardlines have been effectively severed. The reinforced bridge, along with about a third of the ship, floated freely, drifting away from seven other large fragments and innumerable smaller pieces. His order wasn't as brief as 'abandon ship', but there was little need of it, if one happened to inhabit a part which still held atmosphere. "How much power do we have, XO?"

"Enough to last a day or so, if we conserve it. There is only one surviving energy cell in our, well, piece, sir."

"I don't suppose we have enough energy to fire anything we've got left?"

It was a giant shame, which burned silently in the Commodore's mind. His ship – gone. While one could weld the pieces back together, it was probably much more efficient to just assembled a new one. A new one he was unlikely to ever get, now. Not only has he gone against standing orders, he had lost his flagship to a flotilla smaller than his own. He was never going to live this down, and he'd be lucky if he got sent into early retirement. Idly, he wondered if Natasha survived over on the ammunition deck.

"No, sir. Well, we could, once, but then we'd be out like a lamp, sir. We still have open radio broadcast capability, but the encrypted fleetcomm is down with the computer."

"Very well, then, focus on finding survivors and guiding them to safety." He turned on the broadcast again, getting out an electronic pass generator. "Captain Zee, this is Commodore Hayes. You are hereby in command, given the destruction of the 'Black Swan'. One-time code, seven-five-nine-nine-five-zero. Confirm!"

"Confirmed, Admiral! I am in command," came back soon enough.

"Now let's save our people, those we can."

ooo

The Lord Admiral's Vargr gunners howled so loudly that he could hear them through five bulkheads. They had reason to – the enemy flagship was down.

"Save celebrations for later, our job is not nearly done yet, men," Peter the First – soon to be the Conqueror again – chastised them.

It was true. The enemy has been reduced to only three ships that were able to fight back, the rest of them either crippled – or in the case of the 'Black Swan' completely broken apart – but among them was the third-biggest, the thousand-ton pocket cruiser. In addition, it wasn't as if his own ship hadn't taken a substantial beating. The damage control crews worked as fast as they could, and were exceptionally well trained, but there were limits to the miracles they could conjure, especially when the spare parts started to become scarce. Through freak chance, the black globe generator had been disabled – they expected to get it back online eventually, but it was down for the count. If it had failed any sooner, they might have been the flagship to fall apart into so much space debris.

His force wasn't much of a fleet now, composed of his severely damaged flagship, and the three-hundred dton microcruiser 'Savage'. The rest were effectively knocked out of the fight, though luckily, none were destroyed beyond repair. The Mycians would no doubt help with their refurbishment – an unwelcome, but necessary setback, planned the warlord, as the battle largely continued without him. He'd survived dozens of ship-to-ship combat scenarios, against a myriad foes, and his gut was telling him that the odds were on his side now. The Imperials just didn't have the firepower to cut through his remaining defenses, and he definitely had the means to destroy the rest of them.

"Close distance," he ordered. "'Savage', this means you too. We're going in for the kill. Comms, inform the Mycians that we'll be expecting their marines to help out with the Imperial survivors."

"Yes, sir!"

ooo

"That's it, we're out of here!" decided Kaarin prudently. "Engi, fire up the Jump drive, I've already cleared the calcs with the computer."

"Yes, sir!"

Now, it was just a small wait until they were safe. The battle was probably lost – the 'Pagaton' apparently had much more capacity to absorb damage than the remaining Imperial ships. Hopefully, they could figure out something while their enemies were busy with repairing the ships that were crippled – it could take weeks to months, but there were facilities on Caldos, especially if the Mycians aided by the warlord seize the other two major starports on the planet.

"Diverting power now," announced Sai Marte, throwing a switch.

Kaarin braced himself for jump entry. Yosef silently prayed the prayer before the journey. Arthur relaxed in the turret.

Nothing happened.

"Something is wrong! The computer can't stabilize the jump bubble, sir!" reported the Petty Officer. "We can't jump!"

This was very odd, and distressed Kaarin. "What's wrong, exactly? Is it a system malfunction?"

"Um, no, sir, it doesn't look like it. It looks like a... jump damping field of some sort."

"Figure out what's causing it and shut it down."

"Yes, sir!"

Sai Marte left engineering and took over from Yosef at the sensor station. Kaarin meanwhile watched the fight on his display – he didn't have much control over what he saw, being away from the proper terminal, but he could spectate in accordance to current settings. What he saw wasn't good.

ooo

The 'Savage' fell apart entirely under the last volley. It was just the 'Pagaton' and the last two remaining Imperial ships until a meson hit on the smaller of the survivors robbed them of their main computer core. Then it was just the Lord Admiral versus the Captain of that thousand-tonner, and the warlord had the advantage there. It was still a very close thing, though, and even his carefully tuned, cybernetically managed organism felt the rush of emotion, the wild tension of high stakes combat – like his battle against the aliens in Zhodani space, like his fighting retreat against the Ancient battlestation at Grille, like crushing victory against the Belgardians at Eleson. This was what he lived for, these moments where the ones that he wouldn't trade away for any amount of time doing other things.

He very definitely did not think of the damage they'd received so far, keeping it at the back of his mind, something to remember when more pressing matters didn't, well, press. They've lost one ship, two boats, and four other vessels were dead in space for various reasons – destroyed sensor clusters, catastrophic fuel leaks preventing power generation, bridge hits and knocked out maneuver drives. What really hurt, however, was the lost crew. Owing to the late 'Black Swan's' fusion gun, they've received more radiation than they could shake a stick at, and the nuclear missiles that got through didn't help any either. The 'Pagaton' was running on a skeleton crew – only a few of gunners were still in shape to perform their duties, the ship's targeting software picking up the slack for the unmanned but functioning turrets.

The 'Unity II' hit them, they hit back. The Lord Admiral's last two engineers frantically ran to and fro, trying to contain the increasing destruction inflicted upon the flagship. Half of their available low berths were filled with corpses and corpses-to-be, the medical team itself succumbing to radiation exposure and putting themselves on ice before they expired. The pace of destruction slowed somewhat, with the amount of functioning – and capably aimed – weapons decreased in an unsteady downward progression.

It was a wondrous fight, truly fitting to add to his growing list of memorable encounters.

Peter grinned manically, upon his throne, lost in achieving glory.

ooo

"It's the 'Pagaton', sir," diagnosed Sai Marte. "It's emitting some kind of jumpspace distortion field. We won't be able to jump while we're nearby, because it destabilizes the jump bubble."

"Can we risk it? Jump even with unstable bubbles?"

"Surrendering and begging for mercy sounds like a plan likelier to achieve extended survival," noted Arthur.

"Sir, we can't even attempt it where we are. We need to get away much farther to be able to enter jumpspace, so that entry will be possible while being very dangerous."

Kaarin cursed. "I bet it's one of their damn Ancient artifacts."

"Seems likely," agreed Yosef.

"Okay, as it stands, they're going to hammer that poor cruiser into oblivion, and then probably us," Kaarin enumerated the current situation's aspects.

"Unless we surrender," shrugged Arthur. Kaarin ignored him.

"We can't jump, because they're emitting this distortion. How far did you say the field extended?" he looked at Sai Marte.

"I can only estimate, sir. Two hundred thousand kilometers is an educated guess."

"Crap. We'd take hours to go that distance. And the fight will not last as long, the way things are going."

"What can we do, Captain?" Yosef asked.

Kaarin thought, then punched his open hand. "We help. We fight the 'Pagaton', make sure it does not, in fact, win."

"I should remind you that we only have one laser turret, and two lasers in that. Plus, Sai can vet my ballpark estimate that we can survive approximately one solid hit from that flagship."

"I didn't mean fighting – conventionally," said Kaarin, grinning fiercely. "They're ignoring us, right? Yosef, you said they only have titanium steel armour? Well, then, I have a plan."

ooo

Captain Zee was severely unhappy with the present circumstances. Although he had just been promoted to de-facto commodore, the force he commanded was also promptly whittled down to just his ship. He had no reason, and no time, to be happy about commanding the battle – the battle he was also losing. It was just a matter of time. They had no thrust and restoring gravity control was way to the back of the priority list, right after getting missing turrets back online, patching up the minor fuel leak and making damn sure nothing happened to the rapidly dwindling missile stores while they were still on board. Still, with dignity worthy of his office in the Imperial navy, Zee dutifully managed the conflict, trying to inflict maximum damage to the upstart Pagatonians before presumably sharing the fate of the Commodore's ship.

"Sir!" his sensors officer spoke over internal radio. Due to a hull perforation that also included parts of the bridge, they had no atmosphere, making auditory communication difficult without hugging the floor.

"What is it? Spit it out!"

"It's the Scout, sir!"

"The 'Misjump'? What about them?"

"They're accelerating at six gees towards the 'Pagaton', sir!"

Zee understood the officer's confusion. "Weren't they outside of the jump limit? Why didn't they jump out?"

"I don't know, sir!"

"Well, if they want to provide us a momentary respite by eating a laser beam or three instead of us, that's alright with-"

Zee was interrupted by their ship being hit by a meson beam. Fortunately, it wasn't a bridge hit, otherwise he and all his five officers would be dead as dead can be. Unfortunately, the lights flickered.

"Damage report!"

"Power plant hit!"

"Damn it! Damage control teams, drop whatever you're doing, fix the plant! We need that power!" Zee commanded, getting back to the fight proper, and forgetting all about the 'Imminent Misjump'.

ooo

"You – are – crazy – you – know – that?" Arthur said through gritted teeth. The three gees acceleration directly forward pushed him into the seat and apparently wanted to separate his teeth from their natural place fitted amongst the gums.

"It's – not – crazy... if it – works!" objected Kaarin. He had the helm controls in a death grip. His will was strong and focused. His cause was right and just. His ship was small as they went, but in this context, it was very, very large.

"Our Father. Who are in Heaven. Blessed be. Thy name," could be heard from the next seat over.

Sai Marte sat quietly and bore the heavy acceleration without complaint, although shaking, prepared to cut the gravities at a moment's notice from Kaarin.

ooo

"Admiral," the Aslan replacement of his sensors officer – who had take one rad too many and had to go lie down in ice – addressed him, breaking him out of his futuro-nostalgic fugue. "The small ship, it is coming this way, very fast."

"Oh? The 'Imminent Misjump'? Ignore them," said the Lord Admiral. "They don't pose a threat – at least as long as they don't start firing at us. If they do, I'll consider assigning them a turret so they never bother anyone above their league again. They're probably seeking refuge on the planet," he eyeballed their course, "given that they must have realized nobody gets to jump out without my permission."

"Yes, sir."

The battle was going better now. The 'Pagaton' had the edge in amount of functioning guns, and judging from the readings, that last volley hit something important on the 'Unity II'. Soon, perhaps, it would become eponymous, unless there were more than a couple of major fragments, thought the Lord Admiral and smiled to himself.

ooo

If asked, a holovid connoisseur with armchair naval tactics hobbies might reply that there is nothing such as a 'ramming speed', but his answer would actually be wrong. This might have been true for civilizations without antigravity control, but it definitely wasn't true for interstellar society founded on such technologies as jump and maneuver drives. The major problem with ramming was that it would tend to destroy one's own ship or aircraft even if it succeeded – in fact, this was assumed to be the definition of success. With the advent of being able to control and compensate for gravity inside of a starship, other possibilities became reality.

The 'Imminent Misjump' sped along a shortest-route course towards the very occupied 'Pagaton', but when it reached a distance from which dodging began to be improbable and headed rapidly towards 'impossible', it decelerated rapidly, maneuvering to keep itself on target – the side of the enemy flagship's aft, directly where one of their cargo bay doors happened to be – and seconds before impact, put all available gravity control towards compensating the incoming blow. The computer executed a pre-programmed laser volley directly ahead.

Kaarin blacked out.

ooo

From the perspective of the Lord Admiral, things weren't happening quite as fast as for everyone else. He noticed his error ten seconds before he felt it become a serious problem somewhere deep in his ship. The next two seconds were spent analyzing potential interpretations of what he was seeing through his direct neural interface to the ship's sensor suites. Decision was reached in another second. A part of him wondered idly why the proximity alert wasn't blaring long before – hidden battle damage, perhaps? - wasting a fourth second.

"Helm, flip the ship!" he yelled at the pilot. To his credit, the helmsman was quick on the draw and the ship began rotating a full second before impact.

Unfortunately, it wasn't enough, and an enormous clang reverberated across the hull, temporarily deafening everyone on the bridge.

Lord Admiral Peter the First did not curse. That would have been so undignified.

"Damage control team! Status report on that kamikaze attack!" he demanded.

"Damage control team is down, sir!" his comms officer replied. "The marine squad is down too, sir!" she pre-empted his next demand. "It seems like they hit hangar bay two, and got stuck somewhere in the in the internal bulkheads."

The warlord frowned deeply. The computer was of limited utility here, as many of the cameras installed in the public spaces were down, due to battle damage. Since so many of his crew were down also, it posed a rather difficult problem to merely find out just what kind of damage the insane Scout has managed to cause before dying in this suicidal gesture.

"I'll deal with this myself," he said, standing up. "Continue the attack. I remain reachable by comm."

There came a small chorus of "Yes, sir!"s and he sprinted out the newly opened reinforced door.

ooo

Kaarin came to. Curiously, he didn't feel the extreme pain he had anticipated. Instead, it was a dull throb, somewhere in the background. He had vision – in one eye only, the artificial one. Mere flesh had proved temporarily unequal to the task of withstanding so much gravitational forces. Looking around, he found Yosef and Sai still out cold in their seats – at least, he hoped they were merely out cold, as he rushed to unstrap himself from the seat.

Luckily, both of them lived, judging by the fact that they still breathed. Kaarin slapped each a low dosage of combat drug, from the ship's first aid kit, into their suits' medical injector intakes, and proceeded to check on Arthur. Power still worked, and the iris valve opened for him. The Imperial agent turned out to be already awake and staggering out of the computer room.

"That you, Kaarin?"

"Of course it's me, who else would it be?"

"I can't see yet. Only red and black," Arthur indicated thin rivulets of blood running down his face. "Can you see?"

"Yeah, my cyber-eye works even if my real one doesn't. Power's on, did we make it inside? Stupid question, let me see that computer," Kaarin pushed past him and operated the badly mistreated terminal. "We're in! Either that, or all our sensor clusters got fried, indicating static metal reflections in every direction or nothing. Yosef, Engi!"

"Captain?" groaned out Yosef. Sai was unstrapping him from the acceleration harness of his chair.

"Sir?"

"Glad you're still up. Can you see yet?"

"I can sort of see, sir. Not very well. It's getting better."

"As blind as a bat – that's a Terran flying creature..."

"Never heard of it. We have power!" he repeated, as Yosef was freed and helped up. "Now let's proceed with the plan. Engi, ready the script. Yosef and Arthur, regain sight, on the double. I'll scout the outside."

Kaarin overrode the airlock's normal procedures, since there was no air aboard, and exited without having to wait half a minute for it to cycle. Fortuitously, the ship's personnel entrance did not lead directly to a bulkhead or the reactor core of a fission plant. Rather, an open space – judging by the cranes with and without cargo hanging from them, a couple of air rafts, and various containers scattered around by the violence of their entry, they were in the cargo hold. It might have once been pressurized, but it wasn't now – they probably weren't even the direct cause of it with their cutting up the large door and widening of the fissure by driving an armoured starship through it. There was gravity there, but not air.

There were occasional shocks, doubtless due to the incoming fire from the Imperial starship it was dueling with.

"It's clear!" he announced over short range comm. "There's nobody here but I don't know how long that situation will last. What's the situation?"

"Remember to thank your doctors on Dostoevsky, Captain," said Yosef. "We're still barely functional. All those artificial organs must be making the difference."

"We can see now, Captain, after a fashion," said Arthur. "We're coming out now."

"Sir, I've found the design documents for this class of freighter," Sai Marte said. "It's a Corpus Mk. 4 Mid-Size Freighter."

"Where's the main engineering section?"

"That way, sir," she pointed to a staircase at the other end of the bay.

"Let's go!"

They didn't get very far before they were intercepted – by a vacc-suited figure that appeared at the top of the stairs, having just exited a door next to its apex. Said person of indeterminate sex or exact species, given the distance and the bulkiness of a common vacc suit, appeared to shout something at them – it might have been something to the effect of "you there, halt!", but given the lack of air, the only vibrations that could reach them had to travel through the hull, obscuring the sound – and went for their sidearm.

Kaarin responded by opening fire with his laser pistol, not slowing his stride, even as the sentinel fell.

"Faster, faster!"

He passed the body in the decompressing suit, followed somewhat more slowly by Arthur, Sai Marte and Yosef. Luck was with him – the door opened to his prodding of the electronic lock beside it, even as Arthur was already frisking Kaarin's victim for a passkey and taking their snub pistol.

They were met with the overview of the main engineering section of the 'Pagaton'. While on the designs that Sai found, it was symmetrical, in practice, it got shuffled around and extensively modified by its current user. One of the massive fusion power plants was replaced with a much smaller one of odd architecture. There were also other large devices of known and unknown purpose, seemingly placed wherevere there was enough room for them, without any regard to aesthetics. One of the larger structures was visibly scorched, and leaking some sort of vapor, but absent air, couldn't burn.

Kaarin pointed his favored weapon at the sole inhabitant of the place, a mousy-looking human who put their hands in the air upon noticing that the ones entering were not his friends. The Scout Captain advanced upon him and seized the front of his suit with his left hand.

"Which one of these gizmos impedes jump travel?!" he demanded.

"The jumpspace suppressor?" asked the engineer, in surprise.

"Which one!? No stalling!"

"That one!" he pointed, being convinced by the muzzle of Kaarin's pistol being pressed into the front of his helmet's visor.

"Sai, verify this!" he ordered. "Arthur, keep an eye on him! Yosef, keep an eye on the door!"

The Petty Officer went over to the indicated contraption. It looked sort of like a jump drive, but was smaller, and its main coil wasn't shielded. Its entire make was obviously non-human – or rather, non-human in the manner that a There was a computer terminal mounted near it, and cables ran between them, suggesting that it was how one controlled it.

"Verified, sir. The label on the terminal says 'jumpspace suppressor'."

"Good. Can you disable it?" Without asking, he took a satchel from Arthur's shoulder and placed it between the base of the terminal and the inhibitor.

"Um, no, sir. Need a password."

"Arthur, extract password from our friend over there."

The Imperial agent did not require much convincing before the captured engineer revealed the passcode to shut down the alien artifact. While Sai Marte handled disabling it, he implemented the backup plan they had for the eventuality that disabling were not a possibility. He didn't know, and didn't care in this particular circumstance, where Arthur got the detonator and bricks of commercial explosive which he didn't notify him about, in defiance of every common sense shipboard rule – he was glad the paranoid Imperial did. He set the timer for one minute.

"Everybody out!" he yelled when he saw that the device visibly powered down, its lights going out. "Engi, where are the escape pods?!"

"I'm not quite sure, sir. They're optional and not standard for every ship this class."

Kaarin's first reflex was to interrogate the prisoner for the location of said ship feature, only to find that the captured engineer was lying unconscious on the floor. Arthur was holstering a hold-out stunner. That opportunity went out of the airlock fast, and the Scout inwardly cursed both himself for not asking beforehand, and Arthur for being too happy with removing inconveniences. There would be time for recriminations later – if they survived.

"Where do we look first?!" Kaarin turned to Sai again.

Sai Marte explained the most likely locations of the putative lifeboats as they hurried through the door.

"There's no time to waste. We split up, keep in radio contact," decided Kaarin. "Yosef, check the next hold over there. Arthur and Engi – cross the axis, check the cargo bays on the other side. Arthur bow, Engi aft. I'll check the maintenance area here."

They scattered, each their own direction. Yosef went by the upper balcony over the cargo bay, while Sai Marte entered a nearby door. The Imperial agent sprinted towards another one some distance away, in the opposite direction Kaarin himself was going. He got perhaps ten paces before he heard a blood-curdling scream in his radio. Turning around, he saw a marine – no, not necessarily a marine, just someone in the unmistakable cut of Imperial combat armour – removing a sword from Arthur's chest.

"You have been a dire inconvenience, I must say," he heard on the open channel. "Not only have you managed to catch me off my guard, you obviously did something in engineering – I suspect it has to do with my jumpspace suppressor-" There was an explosion, felt through the bulkheads, from the direction of the engineering section. "-yes, there goes the suppression field. I must say, that annoys me a lot more than you might think. You have no idea what kind of effort I had to put to recover that device, and restore it to operation."

"You're the warlord, aren't you?" Kaarin asked, turning to face the enemy. There were perhaps twenty meters between them. Arthur's limp body fell to the floor, sliding off the downturned sword. His suit's self-sealing capability was overwhelmed and air escaped the hole silently.

"I am more than some 'warlord'," said he. "I am the Lord Admiral, Peter the First, of Mora, then of Pagaton. Soon, I would be 'of Sindal', as well – despite your interference."

"You won't get away with this. If we can't stop you, someone else will. The Imperium won't like you killing their people!"

Kaarin couldn't quite see his face, but he couldn't imagine him not smiling smugly right then. "The Imperium is vast, as you should know, Scout, and the Emperor is far away. When I am done dealing with this little situation, including the necessary repairs, I think I will conquer the rest of these little raider-states, and resurrect the old Sindalian Empire. I may not have a claim to the title, but there is something to be said of de facto ownership of the territory. It will be years, perhaps upwards of a decade before the Emperor or one of his dukes do anything – being out in the badlands has its advantages. The Aslan and the Florians, I can deal with."

"Why are you telling me this?" Kaarin asked. Neither had moved since becoming aware of each other.

"Because I was hoping you would reciprocate in a certain matter that I remain curious. Namely, what was the purpose of this stunt? Initially, I had guessed that it was a misguided attempt at destroying my ship. But then, you destroy a certain artifact of mine that doesn't benefit you. Everyone involved is within the jump limit, and either short on fuel or lacking jump engines, so denying the opportunity to jump affords you absolutely nothing. Why destroy my suppressor?"

It was Kaarin's turn to smile smugly. "You'd like to know, wouldn't you? Well, here's my answer."

Lifting his laser pistol, he shot the warlord, aiming for the center of mass. Not that he expected much effect – he could get lucky, but combat armour was rated against even man-portable plasma guns – but he would potentially force the bastard to dodge, or take cover, lest he present himself as an overly good target for pot-shots.

Kaarin didn't expect the warlord to parry the beam with his sword, reflecting the beam into the ceiling above.

He stood there, mouth-agape.

"My turn!" he heard on the radio, breaking the spell of unbelieving shock. With unbelievable speed, the sword-wielding Admiral crossed the distance between them, transitioning into a flying kick. By the time Kaarin attempted to dodge, he was already being sent flying. With gravity functional aboard, he landed on his back and skidded along the floor to impact forcefully against some crates. While briefly stunned, whatever damage the kick inflicted, it wasn't severe.

Kaarin jumped to his feet, firing off several beams at the incoming warlord. These, he did not deflect with improbable parrying powers, letting them simply be absorbed by the heat-distributing layers of his suit. Advancing fast – but just slow enough for Kaarin to empty his battery – he couldn't have looked more utterly confident.

"Are you done yet?"

He was faster than Kaarin, catching up to the back-pedalling Scout without effort. Kaarin dropped the pistol, letting it hang off its power cord, and drew his utility knife. He could hear the warlord's scornful laughter through the deck, never mind the radio.

"En garde!" said Kaarin's enemy. While Kaarin did not understand the words, he did understand their meaning, and raised his blade as he circled. The Lord Admiral, with one swift motion, decapitated the knife at the hilt, the blade lifting gently from the part that remained in Kaarin's grip, and fall to the floor.

"Demon!" the Scout said, suddenly feeling his years.

"I've been called that!" the warlord said, grabbed Kaarin by the front of his vacc suit and hurled him bodily across the cargo bay into a free-standing container. By the time the ill-fated projectile was standing up, he got grabbed by his opponent by the leg. "Consider this a lesson in manners. You should always be courteous to nobility, and very definitely reciprocate when they do you a kindness!"

Using Kaarin as some sort of man-sized rag doll, he proceeded to smash the poor Scout into the container, into the floor, and into the floor again, twirling and twisting to add momentum. There was a lot that Kaarin's new replacement organs helped with, like getting back into it after being subjected to trauma and being able to see despite horrible accelerations, but there were limits on how much they could take as well. After half a dozen times of being smashed into the ground by a man who could apparently fire a PGMP standing up, he was ready to call it quits.

"Now, are you perhaps more ready to divulge what you hoped to accomplish here?" the warlord said, almost friendly, holding him upside down by his increasingly painful leg. Kaarin's head spun, and he wanted to vomit. He groaned out an answer. "I'm sorry, what was that? I'm afraid I don't speak pained grunt."

"Screw... you..."

The Lord Admiral spun on his feet, working up a decent velocity, and hurled Kaarin into the nearest support column. Kaarin didn't get up this time his head spun and his vision was filled with things he didn't know were part of the whole augmentation deal – overstress warnings from his artificial organs were displayed in text form in his field of view. Forgetting that he expended his ammo already, he feebly took hold of the laser pistol and attempted to shoot his antagonist who approached at a leisurely pace, interrupted slightly only by the ship's tremors when getting hit by incoming fire.

"I'm not really fond of this, you know, torture," he said. "Still, there is a time and place for everything. Are you ready yet to tell me what you so desperately want to keep hidden?"

Kaarin tried to say something into the microphone, but it came out as a wheezing gargle.

"What's that? It better not be insolence again. If it is, I may have to turn you over to one of Aslan crew members. Did you know that their dewclaw has some amazing properties when used as a means of inflicting pain, rather than outright injury and death?"

"You... forget..."

"I forget? Forget what, my friend?" the warlord cocked his head at Kaarin, leaning in from a meter's distance.

"I have... friends... too..."

"No, I don't. I'm fully aware than your friends are loose somewhere in the ship, but I've already dispatched-"

He didn't get to finish his sentence, because a multi-ton steel container, previously hanging harmlessly from a crane above them, hurtled down and pressed him to the floor. It was all his augmented reflexes could do to start moving a split second before the impact, so that his head and one of his arms stuck out from under it. His monomolecular-edged blade clattered to a halt a couple of meters away.

"Kaarin! Are you alright!" his suit's internal speaker said with Yosef's voice – he smiled in the direction of the old priest, up in the rafters, next to the crane controls. He came down to help Kaarin up, by which time the manhandled Scout was totteringly standing up, gripping the monosword.

Kaarin advanced on the Lord Admiral, blade raised. The warlord looked up feebly, his helmet's visor stained with blood.

"Go... on..." whispered the radio in his ears. "Do... it... if you... have... the guts..."

"Kaarin," Yosef said.

"What?"

"Don't."

"Why not? He's responsible for the deaths of innumerable people! He's laid waste to entire planets, murdered millions, probably! He killed Arthur!"

"That doesn't give you the authority to judge him," objected Yosef. "Have you not slain your fellow men also?"

"That was different!"

"Remember! You joined the Assembly! If you kill him now, it will be murder – regardless, but especially now! He's defenseless!"

Kaarin looked at the older man, locking gazes with him. Gradually, the homicidal feeling left him. He let go of the sword, allowing it to embed itself upright in the metal tile underneath.

"I didn't want to become like him, anyway," he said.

"Besides, the rumours of my death are a little exaggerated," Arthur said, taking both by surprise. He wasn't standing up – he lay where he fell. "Bastard got my spine, though. Can't feel my legs. Help a guy out, you two?"

The both of them lifted up the paralyzed agent.

"Sir!" Sai reported in. "I've found the life boats, sir! They're between the cargo bays here, take the corridor to the left, then turn right!"

"We're on our way, Engi!"

ooo

The fast drug took its effect, reassuring the Lord Admiral that his suit, although crushed, was still somewhat functional if the automated injector worked. Internal diagnostics were down, which alone said volumes about the state of his body. Only a couple of seconds passed, according to his subjective reckoning, before the reinforcements he called – composed of a gunner and one of his bridge officers – arrived, but he knew that to be an illusion. The clock in the corner of his vision sped by, minutes going by at the rate of seconds, the second a blur of eighty-eights. In the state he was in, there wasn't much he could do but try to think fast. Communication with the rescue team, as they worked diligently to gently lift the container of lanthanum, was effectively impossible. They were reasonably competent, however, so he could busy himself with other matters.

The accursed Scout never did say why they wanted to disable the suppressor. As far as he knew, there were no ships in the volume of space outside the jump limit and within the effect of the artifact. He was very sure of that. Eliminating that from the realm of possible solutions left the two hostile fleets. Most of the ships were pounded enough that jumping would be suicide even a safe distance away from the planet, and most of those were blind or incapable of substantial movement, which left two functional jump drives – the one on his ship, and the one on the soon-to-be destroyed 'Unity II'.

He did not wish to jump away, since he was winning.

The Imperial ship could not likely jump away, because they would be destroyed before they even got close to the jump limit again.

ooo

"Everybody sitting tight?" Kaarin asked his motley crew as the escape pod's interior pressurized.

"Indeed," said Arthur, little feebly. Whatever implants the service gave him seemed to make all the difference between life and death. Even skewered and with his spinal cord severed in the chest region, he survived decompression, and seemed to be stable.

"Debatably," said Yosef. He somewhat better than Arthur did, but that was largely because he did not have a close encounter with a monosword. The highly concentrated dose of high stakes adventure had really worn down the old man, now crashing from an adrenalin high.

"Yes, sir," said the ever-reliable Sai Marte. If she ever showed substantial human emotion, these circumstances did not evoke any. She held a dataslate and a handheld communicator as she set in the acceleration couch.

"Ready to set it off?"

"Yes, sir. Pings work."

"How much time do we need to clear the ship?"

"If this is an Imperial-standard escape pod, then we'll need two minutes, and ten seconds, given the approximated size of the field, sir."

"On the count of three, then, set it to whatever time we need, with as thin a margin you can live with," Kaarin held his hand above the ejection button. "One... two... three!"

He slammed down the button just as the Petty Officer ran the remote script.

The acceleration hit them hard – but not as hard as they ran themselves during their entry – and they were off the 'Pagaton'

ooo

Time was racing fast, but the warlord thought fast too. Augmented well past the possible cerebral performance a normal human being could achieve, he continued deductions as the container was lifted off him and the rescue team recovered his mangled body. Luckily, pain was optional, a mere echo of the grand annoyance it normally was. He could heal, with time and a large helping of self-regenerating augments, but that would take exactly that – time.

If it were not anyone outside the jump limit, and it wasn't the Imperials, or his fleet, then who could it be? The Mycians did not have any jump capability that he knew of, and neither did their petty rivals planetside. What did that leave?

The Lord Admiral connected the dots. The answer was clear as crystal, now that the impossible options have been eliminated. With a thought, he injected himself with the fast antidote. It took mercilessly long to take effect.

"The ship! The scoutship!" he croaked out when he was back on the same temporal level as his subordinates now hauling him past the Type S embedded in the hull.

"Uh, sir? What?" asked the Vargr on his left.

"The jump drive! It's going to-"

The Lord Admiral did not get a chance to finish, when the strangest sensation came over him, direct exposure to a jumpspace bubble being formed around them. Then it was over.

ooo

"Look pa! That's a jump!"

"What? Inside the gravwell? Impossible!"

"He's right! Look! The last Pagatonian ship vanished!"

"Huh. The Imperials win, I guess," said the miner, getting up. "Right, show's over, crisis over. Let's get back to work."

ooo

The 'Pagaton' did not quite 'disappear'. From Kaarin's perspective, even limited by the crappy basic sensor suite the escape pod had, the rear third of the ship blazed up with a blue sheen, then discorporated, shattering the big converted freighter. Since their engineering section was on the aft, the remaining two-thirds lost all power and maneuverability. The 'Unity II' smashed it some more for good measure, but when they noticed that return fire was not forthcoming, they stopped. There was no point!

"We've won!" Kaarin shouted. "We've actually won!"

"I guess we did, friend," croaked out Arthur.

"God be praised!" Yosef intoned.

Sai Marte just smiled and got back to work on her datapad.


	13. Epilogue

A large crowd of courtiers gathered in the royal palace on Tyr – King Atreus summoned all of his vassals to the ceremony. They were a mass of glitter and fancy dresses and robes. Kaarin felt a little silly, in his relatively simple Imperial dress uniform.

"Approach," said the King.

They did. At least Yosef and Sai Marte were on a similar level of relative asceticism, with him in a black, gold-trimmed robe, and her in the Tyrian enlisted dress uniform.

"In recognition of your accomplishments in the recent months, including the sound defeat of the upstart conqueror at Caldos, and the nobility of your spirits, We decree as follows," the monarch said. "Chaplain Yosef – in cooperation with the Patriarch, We hereby nominate you for the position of Bishop of Delia. The appropriate ceremonies shall be held on the following Sunday."

"Thank you, Your Majesty," the priest bowed.

"Petty Officer Sai Marte – We hereby grant you commission within the Tyrian System Defence Force. We have suggested to the Admiral that you be posted within Our Research and Development division."

"Yes, si—Sire, Your Majesty!" Sai Marte replied, saluting.

"And finally, Scout Kaarin Sanders – in repayment of your efforts, which went beyond the call of duty, and your noble sacrifice of your ship, We hereby bestow upon you the entirety of the Extends of Doss as a permanent land grant to be held in perpetuity by you and your descendants, and the title of Count of Doss, likewise."

Kaarin saluted in the Imperial fashion, then bowed.

"Thank you, Your Majesty," he said.

It wasn't quite the retirement he had in mind – but it would do. It would do.

THE END.


End file.
